


The Awakening

by saltylikecrait



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst, Canon Rewrite, F/M, Family, Force Bond (Star Wars), Force Visions, Force-Sensitive Finn (Star Wars), Gen, Hearing Voices, Jedi Training (Star Wars), Lightsabers, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Reformed Stormtroopers (Star Wars), Rey Skywalker, Space Battles, Stormtrooper Rebellion (Star Wars), The Force, Torture, Undercover Missions
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-27
Updated: 2021-02-12
Packaged: 2021-03-02 23:08:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 30
Words: 66,870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24264850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saltylikecrait/pseuds/saltylikecrait
Summary: Full Sequel Trilogy rewrite. Alone on Jakku, a scavenger girl with a mysterious power meets a Resistance droid. Tossed right into the conflict between the New Republic and the First Order, the girl finds her destiny is entwined with that of a former stormtrooper.
Relationships: BB-8 & Rey, Chewbacca & Han Solo, Finn & Han Solo, Finn & Kylo Ren, Finn & Luke Skywalker, Finn/Rey (Star Wars), Kaydel Ko Connix & Leia Organa, Kylo Ren & Rey, Kylo Ren & Snoke, Leia Organa/Han Solo, Poe Dameron & Finn, Rey & Han Solo, Rey & Luke Skywalker
Comments: 267
Kudos: 101





	1. Chapter 1

She saw something that should be hers.

The mountainous ruins of the graveyard were a hazard to all who dared to venture inside the ancient Star Destroyers. Anyone without the experience or knowledge of what to look for and what to avoid was at risk of dying a painful death. Poison, blood loss, falling to their doom. Many scavengers went in and never came out.

But this was where all the good scrap was, and she saw something she wanted. Across a vast gap was a broken door that sat slightly open, and inside, she could see old tech used by Imperial pilots for training.

Glancing around, she made sure there was no sign of any other scavengers in the area before she sat down her bag and removed collected scrap parts. Already wrapped in dirty desert rags, face protected by goggles that once belonged to a stormtrooper helmet, she had enough gear on that could weigh her down from what she was about to do. Bag almost empty, she gripped her quarterstaff as she searched for the best spot to make the leap.

Focusing her sight on the railing ahead of her, the scavenger prepared herself before she broke into a run.

When she felt her boots against the edge, she leapt and willed the unseen power within her to propel her across the gap. Grabbing on to the railing, she gripped the wall with her boots and pulled herself up to safety. She looked down at the fall beneath her. Had she not had this power, she wouldn’t have made it across.

Carefully, the scavenger stopped at one of the consoles, searching the room to see if she could find anything that stored data. Holo discs had been the Imperial’s method of storage, and something she often dug up in these Star Destroyers. Before trying to trade them, the scavenger checked them out to see what they held and made sure they still worked.

When she had filled her bag with as much as she thought she could carry over the gap again, she made the leap one more time and gathered her other gear and scrap she left on the sand-covered surface. She had a good haul today, though heavier than she would have liked. At least she knew the effort would be rewarded today.

Climbing back to the light of the outside world, the scavenger avoided sharp projectiles in the walls and sudden drop offs. With the added weight of her haul, she strained with the effort, sweat beading under her head wrap.

Finally back in the light and away from danger, she shoved her goggles up her forehead and wiped the sweat away with her arm, covered with wrappings to protect her tanned skin from the burning sun. Pulling a canteen from her belt, she lifted it to her lips and sipped the last of its contents. Frowning, she tapped the sides of the metal container, hoping to catch the last few drops of water.

With a sigh, she clipped the canteen back to her belt and pulled a scrap of flat sheet metal to the edge of the dune she was standing on. Sitting down on the metal, satchel securely in front of her, the scavenger moved her legs to push it down the sandy slope.

This was her favorite moment of every day. The sandboard didn’t allow her much control, but that was part of the thrill. A simple minute of fun at the end of a hard day’s work. A smile twitched along the corners of her mouth.

A few seconds later she was at the bottom of the dune. Dusting herself off, the scavenger grabbed her bag and took it to a clunky speeder, fitted with two engines in case one blew out while she was in the desert. She fastened her larger findings into netting hooked to the side of the speeder before jumping into the driver’s seat and racing off.

Zooming through the desert, she paid hardly any mind to the ruined starcraft, aged military equipment, and other Imperial remnants. She saw them every day.

Then her destination came into sight. Barely visible, Niima Outpost was the center of her life. It was where everyone traded their daily findings for food and supplies. There were a few sizable settlements throughout Jakku, but Niima was the largest and had the most offerings.

Really, the outpost was an armpit. No one was particularly friendly. On Jakku, friendliness was often a sign of naivety, and naivety easily made you a target to thieves. She learned quickly not to trust a warm smile aimed in her direction. If the person was just new to the world, well, their smiles would quickly be wiped off their faces. 

Parking her speeder just outside the entrance of the outpost and hauled her day’s findings to a tent where she could clean off sand and dirt from the scrap. Cleaned, it would be worth more when trading. 

The scavengers around her, human and non-human, spoke quietly to each other, talking about their day and sometimes exchanging tips on where to find the best scrap. She never spoke to the others unless she had to, not wanting anyone to know where – and how – she got her best parts. Her power was not something she shared with others and a voice inside her told her, no matter what, to keep the knowledge of that power a secret. 

A few eyes glanced her way, checking out what she brought in today. She would make sure to keep her haul close to her. It only took one day on an empty stomach for her to learn this lesson.

A woman darkened from the sun motioned for her young son to help her clean her day’s scavenging. Even though the child didn’t look to be more than six at the most, everyone had to do work around here to earn their keep. 

What struck the young scavenger, however, was how gently the mother spoke to the boy. A pain of longing grabbed at her heart.

_“I’ll come back for you, sweetheart.”_

_“Rey, be brave.”_

A distant memory resurfaced just for a moment before one of Unkar Plutt’s assistants slammed his hand down at her workstation and barked at her. Startled, the scavenger’s hazel eyes widened as she jumped back into her work.

Finishing quicker than normal, Rey sat up and drug her findings to the exchange counter where the bloated, pale, Crolute, Unkar Plutt stood behind. He inspected every scavenger’s findings and declared a price in food rations. Currency was useless when food was hoarded by a few individuals. Nearly everyone on Jakku was held dependent on Plutt for something.

When it was her turn in line, the Crolute made a grotesque attempt at a smile. It was widely known she was a favorite scavenger of Plutt’s for her remarkable ability for finding the most valuable of parts, which only made her more of a target for thieves. Everyone was dying to learn her tricks, but Rey stayed away from the other scavengers. She didn’t want her secret to be found out, knowing it would be trouble for her, but not knowing exactly how she knew that either.

To make matters worse, he seemed to _enjoy_ their short exchanges, if only to push the bounds of her patience. Today, he quietly and slowly looked at her offerings, lingering on the console repair parts she found in the Star Destroy.

“Rey. Another great offering from you. Three portions.”

Much better than yesterday, when he gave her only a quarter portion. Three portions she could easily extend into six days’ worth of meals. One would go in her secret stash of portions underneath a panel in her home for leaner times, the rest would be her meals for the next two days. If she didn’t want to work tomorrow, she could.

There were other ways to get food on Jakku, and probably cheaper means, but at least with Plutt, she knew what she was getting. Niima was civilized enough that if you dropped dead in its sandy market, someone was bound to collect your body, but not for a respectable burial. It would be a waste to allow such a source of protein to be buried out here. While other scavengers didn’t seem bothered by the idea of consuming protein cubes made from deceased scavengers, Rey couldn’t stomach the thought. Plutt’s portions were rations collected from Star Destroyers and Rebellion starfighters, from unfamiliar worlds where its citizens weren’t barbaric enough to even think about eating their fallen.

Nodding to the Crulote, Rey turned around with her portion packets in her hands. Backpack lighter, she walked out of Niima, to her speeder, home her next destination.

* * *

The sun was setting as she arrived to the part of the salt flats she called home. Out here, there was very little to protect travelers from the heat of the sun, meaning few came here. It was perfect for Rey: quiet, with little opportunity for anyone to accidentally come upon her while she was testing her powers.

The ancient AT-AT didn’t look more than a rusting corpse of a machine on the outside, but Rey knew the half-buried walker as home. She crawled through a panel she rigged to be a secret door leading inside the belly where her living space was. The rest of the AT-AT that wasn’t closed off was used as storage for her gear and supplies.

After placing one of her portions into a compartment hard to find by eyesight alone, she paused before backtracking to one of the interior walls and making a scratch mark to mark off another day. There were thousands of these marks by now and not nearly accurate in telling how long she had been here. She knew she was five years old when she was left here and guessed by the standard calendar on her cobbled-together flight simulator that she was probably nineteen now.

As the green slab of portions in her packets sizzled in her cooking pan, Rey dumped the beige powder into a bowl of water, using her index finger to wet the mixture and activate the chemical reaction that made it puff up into a loaf of bread. The green slab, now cooked, resembled a piece of meat. She slid both items onto one of the few plates she owned, then went outside to eat her dinner.

She sat in the sand, making quick work of her meal and licking the plate when she was done. Eating a full quarter portion instead of an eighth of one like she did yesterday felt far more filling.

An old Rebellion pilot’s helmet sat semi-buried next to her. Picking it up, Rey shook the sand off it and placed it top of the leg of the side-resting AT-AT before backing to her spot where she had been eating.

Concentrating on the helmet, she lifted her arm, hand open with her fingers spread comfortably. 

Across the sand, it twitched back and forth before sliding off the leg and flying through the air towards her, quickly and out of control. Rey caught it with both hands before she sat it on her head and sat back down. 

_Better. Your control needs improvement. Concentrate on pulling it towards you, slowly._

The voice she heard inside her head was familiar. The voice of a man. She imagined she heard the voice of her father trying to help her, or at least that’s what she wanted to imagine. Rey couldn’t say she knew her father or her mother. Her memory of her parents was clouded. All she knew was that they left her here and promised to come back for her. She had waited for them ever since.

_“Rey, be brave.”_

It was the same voice, the one she assumed was her father. The voice she had heard in her head over and over whenever she looked up at the sky and wondered if leaving Jakku was written in her stars.

The voice was why she stayed. They promised her they would return, and she knew they would keep it.

She returned the helmet back to its spot on the AT-AT’s leg and tried again, this time focusing on pulling it at a steady pace. It twitched once before it gave in to her pull. 

It came to her slower than before, but still too quick. Still, Rey took that as an improvement in her skill. Perhaps one day, this power could be of use to her when she was scavenging. As she was, she didn’t dare use it on anything but something just out of reach, fearing jagged edges of metal cutting her hands or worse, or a valuable piece of scrap falling to where she couldn’t retrieve it if she lost focus.

A high-pitched squeal broke her concentration. Confused, she looked around for the source of the noise until she heard it again.

Setting the helmet back down in the sand, Rey grabbed her quarterstaff leaned up against the AT-AT and followed the continuous, hysterical beeping.

Atop a dune, she found the source as she looked below her. A small, spherical droid was frantically trying to escape a net as a Teedo, mounted on a squarish luggabeast tugged to pull it with him.

Normally, she would just turn back. The droid had already been found by someone else and a fully functional droid around here sold for at least a hundred portions. Still, the droid’s fearful beeps and its attempt to get away from its captor tugged at the soft, sore spots in her heart.

She slid down the dune and called out to Teedo. Both he and the droid stopped their struggle to stare at her.

Yelling again in Teedo’s language, she threatened him even as he shouted back. This droid was near her home, and Teedo was violating the common, unwritten code to not take anything found in another scavenger’s territory. She drew her knife for emphasis as she approached the net and cut away at the mesh.

Teedo only grew angrier and unleashed a strain of curses and slurs, one of which was particularly offense to any scavenger.

_Unwanted garbage spawn._

Red in the face, she paused in her cutting and raised the knife again. 

Staring between her and the knife, Teedo realized that if he kept goading her on, Rey might become a physical threat. It was her right, as a scavenger, to defend the territory she claimed for herself. He cursed one more time before he gripped the reins of the luggabeast and turned it to walk in the opposite direction of Rey’s home.

Rey kept glaring, knife held out, until Teedo was a safe distance away. 

The droid rolled away from the net and chirped loudly in direction Teedo went.

“Shhh,” she hissed to quiet the droid. “You want him coming back for you?”

Immediately, the droid went silent.

Kneeling, Rey removed a few stray bits of netting from it as it beeped a series of questions. 

“That’s just a Teedo,” she answered. “One that forgot his manners. Wanted you for parts.” Leaning, she studied the droid’s head. “Your antenna’s bent.” She reached to remove it. “Where do you come from?”

The droid beeped its own answer. _Classified,_ it explained.

“Classified?” Rey was amused. “Really? Me too. Big secret.” After making a quick bend to the antenna to right it, she reattached it back to the droid before she stood up and pointed out to the horizon. “Niima Outpost is that way. Stay off Kelvin Ridge. Keep away from the Sinking Fields up north – you’ll drown in the sands. Once you make it to Niima, you shouldn’t have any trouble.”

Beeping that it understood, the droid turned its head on its round base to face the direction she was pointing in. It rolled forward before it came to a sudden halt and turned back to her.

“Don’t follow me,” she barked. Even if the droid meant her no harm, that didn’t mean its owner wouldn’t if they came looking for it. 

The droid grew anxious, begging her for her help.

“No! You’re not coming with me. And I’m not your friend. This is Jakku. No one’s a friend. You remember that!” Rey turned away again, determined to leave the droid.

The whine the droid emitted made her stop in her tracks. It was low, desperate, frightened.

She felt the soft spot in her heart again, sympathetic to the droid. It was all alone in an unfamiliar, scary world. A long time ago, she was a tiny girl stranded in Niima, all alone with no one to help her. She would have given anything for someone to have cared.

Sighing, she nodded in the droid’s direction to give permission to follow.

In gratitude, the droid beeped once in a cheerful pitch and rolled up beside her.

“In the morning you go,” she told it but couldn’t help the smile on her face when it thanked her. “You’re welcome.”

It told her its name and that it had masculine programming.

“Hello BB-8,” she greeted. “I’m Rey.”

The droid asked for her family name, prompting a frown to fall on her face. 

“Don’t got one,” she admitted. “I’m just Rey. Look, you’re not going to talk all night, are you? I’ve got work in the morning and I need to sleep. You gotta be quiet.”

BB-8 told her he understood and that he would respect her rules. Still, her need for quiet didn’t stop him from making one last observation, one that made her chuckle.

“Yes, there is a lot of sand here, isn’t there?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updated Wednesdays and Saturdays.
> 
> This is going to be a different kind of project for me, because the planned full rewrite is very long. I'm starting by releasing the TFA portion of this rewrite as I work on the next section. Once that section is finished, I will start publishing chapters then, and so on and so on. Because of this, please be mindful that there may be gaps of time that I do not update once I have completed publishing a section.
> 
> The TFA portion also doesn't have many changes to it. For that reason, I didn't feel like rewriting the entire film word for word if there was nothing changed. Keep in mind then, that some scenes might be skipped over entirely and assume they are the same as the film. The first half-hour of Finn's story is cut from this rewrite because nothing has changed. He still defects from the First Order and frees Poe.
> 
> This also means that at times, there are some very short chapters.
> 
> I hope everyone enjoys reading this rewrite. It really does make sense to plan a series by plotting it from start to finish first. This TFA section is just setting up the story for what is to come.


	2. Chapter 2

In the middle of the Sinking Fields, a TIE-fighter plummeted to the ground below and exploded into a fiery ball of metal and machinery upon impact.

Before the explosion, one of the two people inside managed to eject themselves out of the doomed starfighter. Passed out right before hitting the ground, it was a couple of minutes before he came to again. Dazed, the young man gripped at the clips, buckles, and braces that were designed to keep him safely in his seat. They did what they were supposed to do, but now he was struggling to get out. There were a certain amount of steps he had to follow in a certain order to be released, safety standard, and all. In this case, it might have been _too safe_.

Finally free of the safety gear, the young man dragged himself out of the seat and into loose sand. He stood up and took in his surroundings, sweat already beading all over his deep brown skin. 

He was alive, but in this desert if he wasn’t careful, he wouldn’t be for long.

Gazing up at the sky, he thought he would have been followed by an aerial patrol but saw nothing but clear blue spreading as far as the eye could see. Considering what he had just done, he was shocked.

Smoke rose in the distance. He thought about all the things it could be, but in his gut, he knew what was emitting the black plume. Beginning to make his way towards the source, the young man tugged at the black strip of material that sat around his neck and unwrapped it. 

It was far too hot to be out here in stormtrooper gear. 

Looking down a sloping dune, he found the remains of the TIE-fighter he had escaped, wires sparking and in flames. He looked around for any sign of the man who had piloted the starfighter, knowing if he hadn’t ejected, there was little change he survived the crash.

Sand sucked downward at his feet, startling the stormtrooper.

“Poe!” he yelled as he watched the crashed TIE begin to shift in the sand. “Poe!”

Careful not to burn himself on metal or get cut by broken glass, he searched the cockpit, which lay smashed and open to the desert air. He looked closer, squinting when he thought he saw what looked to be an arm and reached for it. With little effort, it came free and the stormtrooper’s strength when he pulled too hard sent him backwards into the sand.

He held up the leather flight jacket in his hands, no pilot attached to it. The stormtrooper tossed it down and ran back to search the cockpit.

“Poe!”

The sand shifted again. A glance downwards made him realize the sand was sliding underneath him, covering his feet. Backing away, he watched as the remains of the TIE started to sink, slowly vanishing under the desert. 

He shouted again, frantically, “Poe!”

And then, the TIE vanished from sight.

The stormtrooper stared at the spot quietly and in shock, not able to fathom exactly how the sand could have swallowed up the starfighter that quickly. It was like it had never been there.

An explosion erupted beneath the sand, sending the stormtrooper flying forward. A fireball blew skyward, red and black pluming into the sky before it too, vanished moments later. From out of the sand, some charred debris resurfaced but no sign of the pilot that had last been seen in the cockpit.

Angerly, he kicked up sand, which was replaced by more sand. Sand everywhere. Too much sand. Why would anyone have any interest in a world such as Jakku? All there was here was sand.

If he didn’t find water and civilization soon, he’d likely die in the sand too.

A warm voice filled his head, his conscious, he always presumed. _You’ve seen the map. Remember where the town was located. Use the sun to help you._ The stormtrooper never knew exactly why his conscious sounded like one of his commanding officers with a Core accent, but he took anything that would help him. Listening to that voice helped him in the past, though it got him into trouble more than enough too.

It also got him stuck out in a desert.

If he recalled correctly, the only town on Jakku was southwest on the map. He looked up to see where the sun was above his head and guessed the town was almost directly south of where the TIE crashed. He hoped wherever he was, he wasn’t far.

Tugging at the wrap collar he wore under his armor, the stormtrooper squinted to see if he could spot anything besides sand. It seemed to grow hotter by the minute.

 _You might not receive a warm welcome,_ said his conscious, _dressed like that. You’re not a stormtrooper anymore._

No, he was _Finn_ now. At least, that was the name the pilot, Poe Dameron gave him when they escaped together.

But the voice in his head was right, he wasn’t a stormtrooper anymore and had no use for this armor. Better to strip it off than to cook out in the heat in his own personal oven. 

He began to peel off every bit of the white armor, discarding the pieces in the sand as he walked south. With it, the last remains of FN-2187 fell, leaving only the man called Finn in his place, left in his black underclothes and the leather jacket that once belonged to a Resistance pilot.

* * *

Finn had no idea how long he had been walking. A few hours, at least. He was thirsty and exhausted, probably on the verge of sunstroke. Poe’s jacket proved its worth to shield the sun as he held it overhead, but his black clothes only held in the heat.

The settlement was just along the horizon and even though it looked more like a dusty junkyard, there would be water there and shelter from the sun. He knew his skin was burned, and he was dehydrated. The only things he could think about was water and shelter. There might be a transport he could get on that would take him away from this horrible world, but that would come second.

When he passed through the gates of the outpost, he knew by the way the locals treated him that kindness was not of value here. Most spared Finn a glance, maybe even laughed at his state, but no one offered him any help. Even those who shot him sympathetic looks made no move to aid him. Jakku was harsh in environment and in behavior.

First, he made a desperate search for water, not thinking about the huge, fat, and ugly creature drinking from the trough as he made way to it himself. He cupped his hands in and brought them up for him to sip, trying hard not to pay the taste of sand and ugly creature any mind. Water was water, and so he kept drinking.

The creature eyed him but paid him no mind for a few minutes until it either tired of the human in his space or decided to be friendly and pushed him over.

On his knees and no longer in terrible need for water, Finn’s attention drifted to the marketplace and a fight that was taking place. A young woman who looked to be about his age was being harassed by two thug-looking humanoids and she was beating them off with her quarterstaff. She looked like she was handling herself.

Surprising based on her size, the woman was able to flip one thug onto his back seconds before she focused on the other, unleashing a fury of kicks and hits. Finn thought about moving on until he spotted a net on the ground near the woman, covering an orange and white, round droid.

Poe Dameron’s droid. The reason Finn was stranded on Jakku in the first place. 

When the other thug had been taken care of, the woman kneeled down and removed the net from the droid, speaking to it reassuringly. The droid turned its head around its base, scanning the area for any more threats. It spotted Finn watching them and beeped something to the woman.

The next thing he knew, a furious and hostile scavenger was running towards him.

 _Don’t run, but stand your ground,_ the voice inside him advised. _She'll just get angrier if you run._

“Woah, hey!” He held up his hands, trying to show he wasn’t a threat to her or the droid. Not running, but still trying to keep his space from her, Finn took a step backwards each time she drew closer.

“What’s the hurry, thief?” the scavenger asked, quarterstaff raised. The droid rolled up beside her, electrical probe extended from one of its panels.

He was confused. “Thief?”

“The jacket.” She shook her staff to motion at the leather pilot jacket he was wearing. “This droid says you stole it. It belonged to his master.”

Looking down at the droid, Finn noticed it was holding its aggressive stance. “Poe Dameron, right?” he asked, prompting the droid to lower the probe. “We escaped the First Order together, but we crashed. He didn’t make it. I’m sorry.”

For a creation that didn’t feel emotion, the BB-unit certainly showed a stance of depression. Its head sloped downward on its base as it slowly retracted the electrical probe and rolled off to the side.

The woman, however, looked impressed. “You escaped the First Order? How?”

Finn grinned. “We stole a TIE-fighter. Poe was the pilot, but I was in charge of the gunnery.”

She studied him, her dark eyes looking less hostile as much as interested now. “So… you’re with the Resistance?”

Something about her gaze made him feel dizzy, but in a pleasant way. She was quite pretty, even under a layer of dust. At the same time, there was something familiar about her, but he couldn’t place it. He just had a feeling he’d met her before, but that would be impossible if she was a Jakku scavenger. Either way, Finn found he liked the way she was looking at him, so he lied. 

“Obviously. I’m with the Resistance,” he said. “Who else would have helped a Resistance pilot than another Resistance member.” Then he lowered his voice and repeated, “I am with the Resistance.”

Leaning on her staff, she grinned. “I’ve never met a Resistance fighter before.”

“Well, this is what we look like. Some of us,” he clarified, feeling like he was stumbling over his words. “Others look… different.”

The scavenger turned her attention over to the droid. “BB-8 says he’s on a secret mission. Says he needs to get to the nearest Resistance base.”

“Apparently he’s carrying a map to Luke Skywalker. Everyone wants to get their hands on it.” 

A strange expression spread on the scavenger’s face. “Luke Skywalker?” she asked. “I thought he was a myth.”

Finn gaped at her. “Seriously?” He knew Jakku had no education programs but still, most people were aware of Luke Skywalker’s involvement in the Rebellion thirty years ago…

Before he could comment however, BB-8 rolled up to them, beeping urgently.

The woman listened to the droid before looking around, concerned. Finn followed her gaze to see the thugs from earlier pointing them out to two stormtroopers.

Fear seizing his heart, Finn grabbed for the scavenger’s hand and started moving backwards, towards the tents of the marketplace. She protested at first, but a moment later the spot they had just been standing at had been overtaken by blaster fire. Still clutching her hand, he wove in and out of the tents, though she was struggling. 

“We gotta get out of here!” he told her. “I know how they chase targets.” When he realized he was giving himself away, he backtracked. “I mean… I worked undercover as a stormtrooper for a few months. I know their procedures.”

“I’m not disputing that!” she shot back. “I know how to run without you holding my hand!” Then she skidded to a halt. “No, not that way. This way!” She turned left, taking Finn with her.

They paused underneath a table, watching the chaos unfold around them in the market. He noticed BB-8 staring to the east, both antennae extended. Listening, Finn waited to hear a sign of what he was afraid was already coming.

“What?” said the scavenger. “Why are they shooting-?”

Finn hushed her, continuing to listen while watching an agitated BB-8. He reached for the scavenger’s hand again, receiving an annoyed reaction from her.

 _“Stop taking my hand!”_ she growled.

From above, an explosion rained down on them. Just as they were clear of the market, Finn looked up to see a TIE overhead, tracking them. It shot again, the impact of the blasts sending the three forward.

When he came to, he was on the ground, the scavenger hovering over him, looking concerned.

“Are you okay?” he found himself asking first.

The concerned look in her hazel eyes turned to shock before it softened into something Finn couldn’t name. “I’m okay. You?”

“Think so.” Sitting up, he did a body check. Both legs still attached. Both arms. Nothing was bleeding. Nothing felt broken. “Too close.”

The woman stood up and extended her hand to help him up. He hesitated at first, remembering her earlier anger when he took her hand. She was offering her assistance, and so he accepted it gratefully.

“Follow me,” she ordered as she broke into a run and ran out the gates of the outpost and the explosions and screams behind them.

There was no cover out here. Finn glanced back nervously to see the TIE wasn’t alone anymore. The starfighters were turning away from the market, looking for the two humans and the droid.

If they spotted them, they were sitting ducks out here.

“We can’t outrun them!” he yelled to her. 

“We might in a quadjumper.” The scavenger pointed at a four-engine transport sitting just ahead of them.

“We need a pilot!”

“We got one!” she shouted.

Finn yelled back in disbelief. “You?” He would have never thought a scavenger had any experience with piloting, but any skill she had was better than nothing. He looked at a ship sitting closer and pointed it out. “What about that one?” 

“That one’s garbage! It hasn’t flown in years!”

The TIEs screeched overhead. Their blasts, this time, targeted at the two’s very destination. The quadjumper erupted into flames, prompting the pair to skid to a halt.

“The garbage will do!” the scavenger agreed.

Making a sharp turn, they set a new course for the transport covered by tarps. The ramp was already lowered, allowing Finn and his new companions to run inside without waiting. 

Just as all three were inside, the scavenger hit a wall panel to recall the loading ramp and then ran for the cockpit. Finn followed her.

“Gunner’s position is down below.” She was busy looking at all the buttons and controls quickly.

“Are you sure you can fly this thing?” he asked, nervously.

“I’ve piloted all kinds of craft before, but no one’s flown this in years.”

Finn grew even more anxious. “Then what makes you think it’ll even get off the ground?”

She still didn’t look at him. “If you’d prefer to take your chances on the ground, be my guest.”

With no response to give her, Finn slid into the gunner’s seat and buckled in. Responding to his weight, the chair swung harshly to the left. Quickly, he grabbed the controls.

“Okay,” he said to himself. “I can do this. I can do this.” The controls were simple. He should be able to figure it out just fine.

The engines rumbled for a moment before humming to life. Finn sighed in relief. At least this old ship still worked. He felt it rise into the air, gravity pushing against him for a moment. Then, they lurched downward, nearly hitting the ground. They struck something, but Finn couldn’t tell what until he saw from the side that the outpost’s entry archway had fallen over.

However, this did not deter the TIEs from giving chase. 

The scavenger took them higher, keeping away from the ground and the obstacles below. Finn knew the First Order would follow them and hoped he could offer a piece of valuable advice.

“Stay low,” he yelled into the internal comms. “It’ll confuse their tracking. If we try to leave the atmosphere, they’ll run us down before we can reach lightspeed.” The ship lurched again. “And put up the shields!”

“I can’t fly and put the shields up at the same time,” she barked back. “No co-pilot.”

The turret spun wildly, making Finn feel a bit queasy. He heard the scavenger yell to BB-8 to find someway to secure himself. The ship dropped sharply as the woman announced, “Shields are up. I’m going low!”

It was a bumpy ride from then on out. Finn concentrated on trying to shoot at the TIEs as they soared around the ship, but found when he tried, the weapons system wasn’t responding. With their shields down, the ship’s only saving grace was flying low. Their enemy shot at them, but missed each time.

Finally, the system booted to life. He moved his weight to spin the turret, shooting at the TIEs as he came in range. It was a far clumsier system than he was used to, and so, Finn missed.

Growing frustrated, he continued firing. “We need cover!” he told the scavenger.

“We’re about to get some.”

They passed through sand dunes and rocky outcroppings. Flying low, they were almost skidding across the sand. One of the trailing TIEs got directly in Finn’s path and he maneuvered the turret to target it.

When he fired on it, the TIE’s wing was hit, causing it to break off and the rest of the starfighter to sink to the ground with a crash.

“Nice shot!” the scavenger yelled to him. A grin spread across his face, but he tried not to let her praise distract him. There was still one more TIE following them.

The ship started grazing rocks and piles of metal debris, rocking everyone inside and causing Finn to sweat. He worried if they took a critical hit from the environment, the lone starfighter would have an easy target.

Their pursuer fired on them again, the blast missing, but too close for comfort. Finn tried to shoot at it, but found the concussion of the blast had locked up the turret. 

“Guns are stuck in forward position!” he told the scavenger. “You gotta lose them!”

A Star Destroyer sat just ahead of them, growing closer and closer as she piloted them towards it. Finn felt his mouth gape. “Are we really doing this?”

But she was going for it. She maneuvered them through the silent and ruined corridors of the Star Destroyer. “Get ready!”

He nodded. “Okay. Okay! I’m ready!” Then he realized he didn’t know the plan. “Ready for what?”

She didn’t answer him as she sped through the Star Destroyer, heading for the exit on the other end. Another shot from the TIE rattled the ship. Finn held his breath.

They emerged into sunlight, flying high in the sky as the scavenger cut the power of the ship and let them swing around as they made a free-fall to the ground. Finn might have vomited with the movement if he hadn’t any experience with such maneuvers. He gripped the controls of the turret, trusting the scavenger knew what she was doing. 

The TIE was now directly in his range. He gripped the control and made the shot just as the TIE did the same.

The fighter missed. Finn, however, did not.

As the TIE burst into flames behind them, the ship ascended into the sky, leaving the world of Jakku and all its sand and dangers.

He unbuckled himself from the turret and explored the ship, finding the center of the ship had been made into a sort of a living area. Breathing deeply, he tried to come down from his adrenaline high. In all his years in the First Order, he had never done something quite this exciting.

The scavenger ran right into him, a bright smile on her face.

“That was some piloting!” he praised.

“Thanks! That was some shooting! I was worried you wouldn’t have time to react.”

They spoke in unison, both congratulating the other and listening to what they had to say at the same time. BB-8 watched this exchange curiously, having a hard time following the conversation.

A lull fell between them as they caught their breaths. As he looked at her, a youthful face with optimism now shining in her eyes, he couldn’t help that feeling of familiarity resurfacing.

The droid whined to them and the scavenger knelt beside him. “Everything’s gonna work out fine,” she assured it. “He’s with the Resistance. We’ll get you to them.” Suddenly pausing, she knitted her brows and stood up once more, looking at Finn. “I don’t know your name,” she confessed.

“Finn,” he told her, realizing he didn’t know hers either. “What’s yours?”

“I’m Rey,” she smiled sweetly. 

He repeated her name, finding it suited her. She didn’t offer him a family name, he noticed. Perhaps like him, she was an orphan too.

The prior thought of perhaps her once also being in the First Order struck him, but just as he opened his mouth to ask, hissing echoed in the corridor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, yeah. Not much has changed. Finn is still the ex-stormtrooper we know and love. I swear Finn and Rey hearing voices doesn't mean they're crazy!


	3. Chapter 3

The hissing turned out to be the motivator, and had she not jumped in and patched it up, they would have been in big trouble.

She learned quite a bit about her new companions while she was making repairs. He didn’t have any love for Jakku – not that she could blame him. The nearest Resistance base that BB-8 knew about was in the Ileeneum System. And for a Resistance member, Finn didn’t know much about tools and ship mechanics. Rey assumed not everyone in the Resistance would know about that stuff, and Finn mentioned earlier that he had been working undercover. He probably just had a different skillset than her.

Finn really wanted to know why she wanted to get back to Jakku after dropping him and BB-8 off at the Resistance. She waved off his question, not wanting to explain that she was waiting for her parents to return. Few people understood why she was still waiting for them after fourteen years. Those people always looked at her in pity when she told them; she hated that.

Now that the motivator was fixed, she sat back up on the ship’s floor, her legs dangling down where she was working under the panel, and wiped the sweat from her forehead. Finn was still trying to figure out why she wanted to go back to Jakku, this time guessing she had a boyfriend to get back to. She wasn’t sure why, but he seemed more bothered by this than his other guesses. 

The lights suddenly dimmed overhead, and Finn went silent. Beside him, BB-8 beeped nervously.

“That can’t be good,” he said.

“No,” she agreed. “It can’t.”

They went back to the cockpit and found the console was dead. She began looking for the source of the problem, starting to wish the quadjumper hadn’t been destroyed when they went for it first.

“It’s the motivator, isn’t it?” Finn asked. Like the droid, he too, was anxious.

She kept searching for an answer, though she already thought she knew what was wrong. “I fixed that.” Trying a few more commands on the console and getting no response out of it, she slumped back into the pilot’s seat. “Someone’s locked on to us.”

Finn put his foot on the co-pilot’s seat and used it to give him a boost to look out the top viewport. He fumbled as he tried to keep his balance, accidently placing his hand on Rey’s head and pushing down none too gently. 

“Hey!” she grunted as she tried to slap his arm away in annoyance. 

“Sorry,” he muttered, but he was otherwise distracted.

“See anything?”

“Yeah.”

Approaching behind them, a gigantic heavy freighter loomed. Its cargo bay was open, and as large as the freighter was, their own stolen vessel looked like prey about to be swallowed up.

Finn slumped down in his chair. “It’s the First Order,” he said.

“What do we do?” she asked him, desperately. Surely, he would know something that could get them out of this.

“Die?” he suggested.

_“Besides dying!”_

He took a moment to think again. “We could run, if we got the engines up. Or we could fight, but neither of us have weapons.” 

Rey thought about her powers, but hesitated to tell him about them. They hardly knew each other, and she wasn’t sure how much use they would be against multiple stormtroopers. Still, she wouldn't resign herself to not use them if she was cornered.

Then, he paused and turned to her. “Earlier, when you were working below, you said something about poisonous gas?”

Rey wasn’t sure what he was getting at. “Yeah, I fixed that.”

“Can you _unfix_ it?”

It took her a moment to understand his idea, but when she did, a ray of hope struck her. They ran back towards the lounge with BB-8 and grabbed a set of emergency masks on their way.

Together they moved the heavy panel and Finn leapt in as Rey tried to help him lower BB-8 to hide. Then, she jumped down and moved the panel back before she got to work. 

“You think this’ll work?”

“Standard issue helmets are designed to filter out smoke, not toxins,” Finn explained. “I doubt they’ll think to check for airborne pollutants.”

She was impressed. “You know your stuff. Did you learn all this while undercover?”

“What-?” he began, then added, “Oh yeah. That’s where I learned this.”

They heard a muted hum in the background. The ship’s ramp was being lowered.

Finn whispered, “Hurry!” 

“Does it look like I’m taking my time?” she deadpanned as her fingers worked quickly to undo the seal she made.

Suddenly, the cover over their heads was pulled away, leaving her feeling too exposed for comfort. She raised her hands in surrender, but when she looked up she saw not stormtroopers like she was expecting, but an aging man with gray hair and a scowl on his face.

The man held a blaster though, and when he told the pair to get out, they did as they were told. He didn’t look like he would be in the First Order, though Rey would admit that she had never seen an officer before, just stormtroopers.

“Where are the others?” the man asked. “Where’s the pilot?”

“I’m the pilot,” she confessed.

He looked at her in disbelief. She knew that look and wanted to roll her eyes. He thought she was too young to know anything. _“You?”_

“It’s just us,” Rey insisted. “Us and a droid.”

The man was joined by a companion, a Wookiee, definitely not a stormtrooper. She no longer believed they had been captured by the First Order, but then, who were these guys and what did they want? There hadn’t been enough time for Unkar Plutt to put a price on them and the ship, so she didn’t think they were bounty hunters.

The Wookiee looked them up and down. [“They don’t seem old enough to know how to run a ship by themselves,”] he observed.

“No, it’s true!” she responded. “We’re the only ones here.”

Finn turned to her. “Wait, you can understand that thing?”

Of course she did, she thought to herself. Wookiee traders were common enough on Jakku. She spoke quite a few languages, or at least enough that she could get by when trading.

_“That thing_ can understand _you,”_ the man growled to Finn. “So watch it.” He used his blaster to gesture them to move away as the Wookiee put the panel back in place. His brown eyes caught Rey’s. She realized he almost smiled, half-playfully and unthreatening. Still armed with a blaster, she wasn’t quite comfortable letting her guard down around him. 

He didn’t want to hurt them. Wasn’t going to, at least, as long as they cooperated.

“Where’d you find this ship?” he asked.

“Niima Outpost,” she told him.

_“Jakku?_ That junkyard?”

Finn beamed. “Thank you!” He turned to Rey. _“Junkyard,”_ he repeated, as if it were the perfect description for the world. They had argued about Jakku’s merits earlier.

Turning attention away from the pair, the man looked up at the towering Wookiee. _“Told you,_ we should have double-checked the Western Reaches.” He turned back to Rey. “Who had it? Ducain?”

“Unkar Plutt,” she corrected.

“Never heard of him.”

She went through a list in her head. “I stole it from Plutt, who stole it from the Irving Boys, who stole it from Ducain.”

“Who stole it from _me!”_ His anger wasn’t directed at her. It seemed more like frustration than anything else. Rey was just happy he didn’t know who Unkar Plutt was, so at least, he wasn’t in the Crolute’s circle of shady con men. “Well, you tell him that Han Solo just stole the _Millennium Falcon_ back for good!”

Rey felt her eyes widen. She knew that name; had heard stories of him throughout the marketplace growing up. He was a legend among smugglers.

Her legs seemed to move on their own as she followed him down the corridor. Behind her, Finn followed, but more out of curiosity than the awe that was carrying her.

“This is the _Millennium Falcon?”_ Excitement welled in her. She stared at the man, Han Solo. A living legend was in her presence. She never thought she’d ever meet anyone famous. _“You’re_ Han Solo?”

“Yeah, kid. That’s me.”

Which meant the Wookiee beside him had to be the _Chewbacca._ She stared at the pair almost with hero-worship. They were some of the most accomplished smugglers of their time. 

“The Rebellion general?” Finn asked. Clearly, he wasn’t as excited as Rey, but she assumed he had already encountered some amazing people in his life, being in the Resistance and all. Maybe even Leia Organa herself. 

“The smuggler,” she corrected.

Finn shook his head in confusion. “Wasn’t he a war hero? Is there another Han Solo?”

The man and the Wookiee paid them no mind as they looked over the cockpit and the console, talking among themselves over how poor of shape the ship was.

“This is the ship that made the Kessel Run in fourteen parsecs!” she told Finn. 

_“Twelve!”_ Han corrected before he went to touch a modification above. “What moof-milker installed a compressor on the ignition line?”

Rey grimaced. “Unkar Plutt.” She remembered nights when she would poke around ships in Niima to learn more about them. She never took anything so no one seemed to mind, if they even noticed. It was why stealing this ship was a little easier when it came to making the run. “I thought it was a mistake too,” she confessed. “Puts too much stress on the—"

“—hyperdrive flow,” she and Han said in unison. He gazed at her again, a little more closely, like he was trying to figure out who she was and why he had never heard of her before. But almost as quickly as the curiosity showed on his face, it vanished. 

“Where should we drop you off?” he asked. “We'll land or send you in an escape pod.”

Nerves bit at her. They couldn’t leave now. “Wait! We need your help.”

“My help?” Han looked a little amused. 

Looking down, she searched the ground for BB-8 and waved for him to roll up to them. “This droid needs to get to a Resistance base as soon as possible. He’s carrying a map to Luke Skywalker.”

Han’s hands froze on the console in shock. Staring out the viewport of the _Falcon,_ his gaze was distant, lost in thought.

Finn spoke up. “You are the Han Solo of the Rebellion, aren’t you? You knew him.”

“Knew him?” Han hadn’t turned to look at them. “Yeah, I knew Luke.”

A sudden _thunk_ was heard from outside, startling everyone inside the _Falcon._ Han scowled. “Don’t tell me a rathtar’s gotten loose,” he mumbled as he exited the cockpit.

Everyone followed him out of the ship. Rey was confused, however. She wasn’t sure what Han was talking about. Whatever it was, Finn looked a little sick at the thought of it, which she knew meant it couldn’t be anything good.

He strode up to Han. “Don’t tell me you’re hauling rathtars.”

“I’m hauling rathtars,” Han affirmed, making the other man groan.

Standing to the edge of the cargo bay of the massive freighter, Rey glanced at a console showing various interior and exterior views. She paused when she saw another ship approach. Non-military, but the paintjob included a strange red symbol she had never seen before but reminded her of the sigils of gangs that showed up on Jakku.

“Friends of yours?” she asked.

Han sighed. “The Guavian Death Gang.” Chewbacca moaned lowly. “Yeah,” he agreed. “They must have tracked us from Nantoon.”

They kept moving through the metallic corridors of the freighter. Rey hung back and looked at Finn. “What’s a rathtar?” she whispered. 

Hearing her, Han answered first. “They’re big and they’re dangerous. Ugly. Very ugly.”

That didn’t clear anything up for her. She blinked. “Okay… and why would someone want to pay for that?”

“People got funny hobbies,” Han explained. He turned a corner.

“Ever heard of the Trillia Massacre?” Finn asked her.

“No.” Rey suddenly felt a lot less knowledgeable about the galaxy, though she knew she had major gaps in nearly every subject.

He replied, _“Good.”_ That was all the explanation he gave. It was enough for her to get the gist of it. Rathtars were bad. Really bad.

Finn caught up to Han again. “How many do you got?”

“Three.”

“How’d you get _three_ on board?” 

“Let’s just say I used to have a bigger crew.”

Rey had a bad feeling about this as they came to a halt in the middle of a hallway. Pressing a button on a panel which had been previously hidden in the walls, Han stood back as two panels in the flooring split apart. He pointed to the pair and back to the panels.

“Stay below deck until I say so,” he ordered. “Don’t go wandering around and don’t _even think_ about taking the _Falcon.”_

“What about BB-8?” Rey asked.

“He’ll stay with me.”

Finn interrupted. “Where are the rathtars?”

“That’s why you shouldn’t be wandering around,” Han repeated. “Don’t think you’d be as happy to see them as they are to see you.”

A _thud_ hit behind them, causing Finn and Rey to startle and whirl around to find the source. In a viewport, they could see an orange ball of flesh with tentacles hit against the pane.

Han added, “There’s one.” He waved back to the floor. “Now, get below. And stay _quiet!”_

Worry sprung up within her. “What are you going to do?” she asked as she approached the panels.

“Same thing I always do.” He shrugged. “Talk my way out of it.”

Next to him, Chewbacca didn’t look impressed. [“Like you did on Castillon?”] he grunted.

“That is so unfair!” Han groaned. They continued arguing as they backtracked down the corridor they came, leaving Finn and Rey alone. 

She lowered herself down, Finn following behind her, and when they were on their hands and knees, Rey pressed the panel on the access way floor to lift the panels back into place. As she crawled forward, Finn hissed, “Han told us to stay put!”

“I’m just following where he went,” she replied. “He and Chewbacca are going to be outnumbered.”

“And how are we going to be any help? We don’t have weapons!”

Ignoring him, she kept crawling until she heard voices above and paused.

“The problem is,” and unfamiliar voice explained, “we loaned you fifty thousand for this job.”

Finn lifted up on his knees, trying to get a closer look.

“Can you see anything?” she asked.

“No, but at least they’re not shooting yet.”

She didn’t like that. The likelihood of blaster fire was high and Han Solo wasn’t quite the legend she heard about; even he seemed to overestimate his ability to get out of tight spots. If she had met a man like him in Niima, she would have wondered why he wasn’t already dead. 

Crawling, she turned herself in the other direction and passed Finn. “What are you doing?” 

“Heading to the _Falcon,”_ she told him.

“Han told us to stay away from the _Falcon!”_

Looking back at Finn, she explained, “In the likelihood Han ends up on the loosing side, I’d rather not take my chances. If Guavian Death Gang finds us, how much do you bet we’ll be rathtar food.”

Silently, Finn thought her words through before he relented. “Right behind you.”

Another group of intruders entered the corridor, heavily armed and not at all friendly. They didn’t seem to be the same group as the other, but Rey doubted they came to back up Han. 

Behind them, Han said, “Oh, come on, Bala, how long have we known each other?” It seemed he hadn’t spotted this new group yet.

They moved faster away, towards the _Falcon._ Spotting something that could be of use to them, she halted suddenly, causing Finn to crash into her. “Now what?”

She tapped on a wall covering to show him. “I might be able to manually disrupt the programming. If I’m able to trip the emergency sequence and drop all the blast doors in this area, I can trap the gangs.”

He looked up at the scene above them and nodded. “What about Han and Chewbacca?” 

“They’ll be separated from the gangs. We’ll figure out how to rescue them later.”

Finn nodded enthusiastically again. “Do it.”

Opening the panel, she fidgeted with the controls, bringing Finn to her side to help her. 

The intruders were laughing above them and cut off when the lights flickered off for a moment before coming back on brighter than before.

Rey gasped, eyes wide, as she leaned back from the panel.

“What?” he asked nervously.

She felt the blood leave her face. “Wrong reflow. I opened _everything.”_

They stared at each other for one horrified moment before the gunfire started, followed by terrorized screams.

Hurrying away, they to avoid stray blaster fire and overheating metal. “This was a mistake!” Finn shouted.

Rey agreed. “Huge!”

Moving as far away as they could from noise, they didn’t stop crawling until they heard nothing but silence above them. She calculated their chances. They were close to the Falcon, but leaving this space meant putting themselves at risk. At the same time, staying below deck easily would mean they would lose their chance to get to an escape ship and be left at the mercy of the rathtars.

They came across another set of floor panels and Rey hit the switch to open them. Poking his head out, Finn looked back and forth to make sure they were clear. He climbed out and offered his hand to Rey to help her up. Unlike when they first met on Jakku, she took it without hesitation.

Searching up and down the corridors, they saw nothing. No gang members. No rathtars. No Han or Chewbacca.

They sprinted towards the far corner where they believed the cargo bay to be. 

“Rathtars…” she panted. “What do they look like?”

As they turned the corner, she got her answer. An enormous red orb, covered with red pustule spots and tentacles reached for one of the red-helmeted gang members. It pulled it to its gaping maw, full of rotating, razor-sharp teeth. 

Gaping, she watched as the gang member screamed before going silent. 

“They look like that,” Finn whined as she felt him reach for her arm. On auto-pilot, she reached back and let him lead her away.

Turning around another corridor, she felt Finn trip and be dragged away from her. She spun around to watch helplessly as a rathtar carried him away.

_“FINN!”_

Rey gave chase, but quickly found she had lost them. She kept running, hoping that miraculously, she would catch up. Anger heated her blood. Finn was one of the few friends she had, and certainly the only human friend she had. She had just met him and now the galaxy was trying to take him from her.

She came to a fork in the hall and halted for a moment. Listening, she tried to see if she could hear signs of the rathtar or Finn.

“Which way do I go?” she asked herself, helplessly.

It was her imagined voice of her father who answered her. 

_Trust your instinct. Where is it telling you to go?_

Left. Instinct told her to go left. 

Running, she passed discarded weapons and armor of the gang and tried not to think about the fate they met. Right now she was more concerned about-

Finn. There he was.

Instinct led her to him and instinct brought her to her next move. She lifted her hand and felt herself connect to the power within her, aiming her arched fingers at the creature.

The rathtar stopped in its track, struggling as if grabbed by an invisible hand. Confused it ceased the violent movement of tentacles for a moment before trying shake away.

She squeezed her hand and watched as the round body of the rathtar contract inward. It whined, and she squeezed harder, until it made an ear-piercing scream.

Tentacle releasing the human in its grasp, Finn fell to the ground and shakily picked himself up. He looked at the creature before turning to Rey, eyes rounding in shock.

“Rey?”

Not loosing her focus on the rathtar wreathing in pain, she thought about what she should do with it next. It attacked them, took her friend. It would have killed Finn if it got away. She should kill it. On Jakku, no one would have questioned her for doing so. They would have agreed with her.

_But that is not you, Rey,_ her father’s voice soothed.

For a moment, she wanted to ignore the voice. It was just a figment of her imagination, after all.

“Rey?” Finn said again. He sounded frightened.

Another voice filled her ears. A scream. A child’s scream. It startled her, forcing her to let go.

She collapsed to the ground, the rathtar doing the same. It turned to her, watching the predator it thought was its prey, then slowly dragged itself away, whining like the wounded animal it was.

Shaking, she clutched her arms close to her. The world around her seemed to blur. Air seemed hard to suck in. She had to… go somewhere. Where? Where was she going?

“Rey?” A warm hand touched her shoulder, bringing her back to the freighter’s bright corridors and the situation she was facing. Finn’s face came into focus. It didn’t have the soft expression she found herself already fond of, it was crinkled with worry. “Are you all right?”

“Finn!” she gasped. “You’re okay!”

He looked at her curiously and with fright. “What was that? What you just did?”

A different fear seized her. He had seen her use her power to stop the rathtar. No one was supposed to see that. 

“You can’t tell anyone,” she pleaded. “No one. _Please.”_

“I’m not even sure what I just saw,” he told her, but he didn’t press for answers. Still, she wondered if she could trust him.

_You can,_ the voice assured her.

Standing up, they started running back the way they wanted to go. They saw Han Solo and Chewbacca running past them and realized they were going the right way.

The four made it to the _Falcon’s_ ramp, with Han immediately barking orders.

“Shut the hatch behind us,” he ordered Rey. To Finn, he said, “You take care of Chewie.” Rey noticed the Wookiee was clutching his arm close to him, like he was hurt. Finn went to his side nervously, trying to get the anxious Chewbacca into the ship without losing his own arm.

Getting right to it, she went to the panel to hit the button to lift the ramp and close the hatch. It wasn’t much work, really. The engines of the _Falcon_ purred as Han prepped them for immediate take-off.

Suddenly, she remembered something important and ran straight to the cockpit and jumped into the co-pilot’s chair.

“Hey!” Han shouted. “Passengers back there!”

“Unkar Plutt installed a fuel pump,” she explained, without looking away from the console. If we don’t prime it, we’re not going anywhere.

“I’ve never met the guy and I hate him,” Han mumbled.

She continued to work. “He’s a pretty unlikable guy,” she agreed. “And I think, you need a co-pilot. Gesturing behind her, they heard a Wookiee growl just as Finn yelled out, _“C’mon, Chewie! It’s just a flesh wound!”_

“Fine!” Han relented. “Fuel pump’s primed anyway. We’re gonna jump to lightspeed.”

Her mouth gaped open. “Can you do that?” From everything she had ever learned and done, jumping to light speed from inside a hangar was impossible, if not, dangerous with a high probability of fatality. 

“I never answer that question until after I’ve done it.”

Before she could argue with him, something big hit the _Falcon_ and rocked it to the side. Moments later, a teeth-filled maw covered the forward port.

Rey couldn’t help the scream she made.

“This is _not_ how I thought this day would go,” Han mumbled angrily. “Shields up,” he ordered. “Angle them.”

“Got it.” At least she knew where the shield controls were. “I’ve noticed you have some interesting modifications.”

He shrugged. “I did a little tweaking here and there.” Rey wanted to snort, that was an understatement. “You may not believe this, but some people don’t like me.”

“Can’t imagine why,” she said dryly.

With the _Falcon_ powered up, it drew the attention of the remaining gang members and their blaster fire. Everything was ready, at least. Rey just waited for Han’s decision. Part of her hoped he would have second-thoughts about his plan.

“Hang on back there!” he shouted through the internal comms. “We’re leaving.” He rested his hand on the hyperdrive control. “C’mon baby,” he said to the ship. “Don’t let me down.”

Nothing happened. In disbelief, Han shouted, “You gotta be kidding me.”

Rey suddenly remembered there was one last thing they had to do. “Compressor,” she explained as she pushed one more button.

He glared at her, but as he tried the hyperdrive control one more time and the _Falcon_ began to shake, it turned into a smile.

The engines roared to life. Gravity tugged them strongly forwards as the freighter behind them, and all the gang members and rathtars too, vanished from sight.


	4. Chapter 4

For as little that was going right on board the _Millennium Falcon,_ Finn at least would admit that the alarms, whatever they were for, were quite functionable. As hard as he was trying to ignore them, he was increasingly finding them annoying.

He heard Han and Rey shouting to each other, but more in a rushed and stressed kind of way than shouting that suggested hostility. Finn guessed they were trying to keep the ship operational. Hopefully, it wasn’t anything that was going to blow up the _Falcon._

Now that Chewbacca was taken care of and Finn’s shoulder was sore from trying to calm down an overreacting and dramatic Wookiee, he had time to sit down for a moment to catch his breath. He’d offer help in a moment, but he had the feeling they would want him out of the way while they ran around the ship to fix things.

Han strode out of the cockpit and stopped to peek inside the lounge for a moment. Eyeing his wounded co-pilot sitting on the bed in the corner, he sighed before he headed back to help Rey.

Finn couldn’t help but think back to when she rescued him from the rathtar’s grasp. He thought he was dead for sure and then… he was on the floor of the corridor.

There was something about the way she held her hand out towards the creature, like she was gripping an invisible ball. She may have saved him right there, but he would never forget the anger in her eyes as she used an invisible force to hold the rathtar in place. The way it screeched made it obvious that she was inflicting pain on it somehow.

Recalling the massacre on Taunal just the night before, he saw a figure in his mind, towering and clad all in black. He held his hand out a similar way that night, stopping a _blaster bolt_ in its path and held it there. The man was called Kylo Ren and the stormtroopers told stories of his powers of how he tore ships apart with his mind and broke prisoners with a flick of his wrists. No one knew much about him except that he directly served Supreme Leader Snoke and did his bidding.

When Finn made the choice not to attack the villagers he was ordered to fire on, he felt Kylo Ren’s gaze on him, watching him. This wasn’t the first time he thought that either. It sent a chill through him, knowing that no matter how much he insisted his blaster had jammed, there was someone who knew the truth and could either hold it against him or proclaim his guilt. Either way, he was done for. So, he freed a prisoner and ran.

And now, here he was, a First Order defector in the company of two Rebellion legends and a girl that reminded him of Kylo Ren. 

Well, not really. Rey wasn’t Kylo. She saved Finn and even though their initial meeting was rocky, she had only shown Finn camaraderie, something few people had ever given him. He trusted Rey and something told him he was right to.

Chewbacca was still moaning, but Finn was certain he was just doing it for show at this point. He had administered an analgesic to the Wookiee and it should have worked by now. Checking back on his co-pilot, Han poked his head in.

He gave a few words of comfort to his partner before he turned to Finn. “Good job with Chewie,” he praised. “I—thanks.”

Smiling, Finn leaned over the table in front of the lounge booth and his elbow slipped, hitting a switch and bringing it to life. He blinked blankly at the pieces of the game that just flickered on, waiting for his instructions on what to do. 

Rey finally joined them, looking bewildered. “I think we’ve got everything. At least, to get us where we need to go for now.”

As Finn turned the game off, Rey slipped in next to him. Standing away from them, Han regarded the pair. “So, fugitives, huh?”

Nodding, Finn pointed to BB-8. “He has a map to Luke Skywalker. The First Order wants it as much as the Resistance.”

“And I’m with them,” Rey added. “And they’re with the Resistance, so I guess the Order thinks I am too now.”

Han eyed Finn in particular, leading the young man to sit back and gulp quietly. The look in Han’s eyes was skeptical.

He knew.

But instead of saying anything, he turned to BB-8. “Let’s see what you got.”

The droid rolled into position, and his projector flickered before flooding the lounge with light. Surrounding them, an enormous star map, detailed with nebulae, dark matter, and solar systems displayed. It was an impressive map; far more detailed than any map the First Order had ever shown him.

However, Han was frowning. Moving towards the projection, he tracked around it, looking for something. He held up a finger to a spot that Finn finally noticed was only half-filled in.

“It’s incomplete,” he mumbled. “Ever since Luke disappeared, people have been looking for him. Maybe this could at least help us pinpoint an area to aim a search. Still… that’s a lot of worlds to check.”

“Why’d he leave?” Rey asked.

“He was training a new generation of Jedi, but a series of tragedies befell him. Finally, one boy, an apprentice, turned against him and destroyed the temple. Killed the students.” Han’s eyes clouded like the memory was drowning him. “It was too much for Luke. He walked away from everything.”

Finn didn’t want to pry too much, but he had questions. “Do you know what happened to him?”

“There have been rumors and stories floating all over the galaxy. The people who knew him best think he went looking for the first Jedi temple.”

In awe, Rey asked, “The Jedi were real?”

“I used to wonder that myself,” Han admitted. “Crazy thing is, it’s all real. The Jedi, the Force. All of it.”

Rey’s powers came back to Finn’s attention, causing him to glance quietly at her. She didn’t seem to notice. He had heard of the Jedi, but the First Order had insisted they were just legends, a child’s bedtime story. Anyone who claimed they were one was just a crackpot magician.

And yet, Kylo Ren was among their ranks, stopping blaster bolts in their place like it was magic.

Han Solo didn’t seem the kind to buy into tall tales, so if he believed the Jedi and the Force was real, Finn had every reason to believe it was true.

An alarm sounded, startling him and Rey. She jumped out of her seat, looking around to see what else needed to be fixed.

“Relax,” Han announced. “It’s nothing bad. This is our stop.”

* * *

There were many worlds he had seen, but immediately on arrival, the lush, peaceful, green forests of Takodana became a favorite of his. He scanned over the blue lakes and the clouded sky, noting how it didn’t seem to be a very populated world. That made him feel a little more at ease, but he knew not to keep his guard down.

“I didn’t know there was so much green in the galaxy,” Rey whispered, in awe.

The cockpit went quiet. Finn realized that though he lived in constant fear of the wrath of the First Order, he should at least count his lucky stars that he got to see worlds besides a dusty junkyard. He suddenly had the urge to share all the beauty in the galaxy with her.

Han made a slow descent to the ground, near a stone castle that looked to have been crafted once by hands instead of industrial tools. The landing area was filled with ships that resembled the _Falcon’s_ exterior – worn, but well maintained. It didn’t appear to be a single First Order craft anywhere.

Rey and BB-8 ran down the ramp ahead of them, but Finn stayed back with Han as he searched the storage units, where he retrieved blasters.

“Solo,” said Finn, approaching behind him. “I’m not sure what we’re walking into. Some info would be nice.”

Han half-turned with a frown. “Did you just call me _Solo?”_

“Sorry, _Han,”_ Finn corrected. “Look, I’m a pretty big deal in the Resistance, which puts a target on my back. I just need to know there’s not any conspirators here. First Order sympathizers?”

Waving him away, Han replied, “Listen, _big deal,_ you’ve got a bigger problem. Women always figure out the truth.” He handed Finn a blaster. _“Always,”_ he added for emphasis.

He knew. Finn’s mind was growing anxious by the minute. Was he implying that Rey knew too? As excited as she was to meet a Resistance member, Finn’s heart tightened at the thought she would learn he lied to her. He didn’t want to let her down. He hated lying to her.

As he exited the _Falcon,_ he found Han and Rey speaking together, Rey now clutching a small hand blaster.

“You got a name?”

“Rey,” she told him, holding the blaster like she was pretending to aim for an unseen enemy.

“Is there a last name?” Han asked. 

“No.”

Finn went to the edge of the lake to look around. The clear water reflected the sky like a mirror, its surface calm and still. He didn’t see any signs of stormtrooper patrols, but the ships around him suggested this was a prime spot for smugglers and spacers to hang out at.

The three humans and BB-8 gathered together, Han leading them towards the castle while Chewbacca remained behind to make more repairs.

Strung along the stonework, many colorful flags waved gently in the wind. Some were old, frayed, and faded from the sun. Others were newer, more vibrant. The castle was a smuggler’s watering hole, but Finn could not distinguish if he would find anyone here who might wish to turn him in to the First Order.

“Why are we here again?” he asked Han.

“Maz Kanata has run this place for a thousand years. Wanna get BB-8 to the Resistance? Maz is our best bet.”

Rey was puzzled. “Is she a Resistance sympathizer then?”

“She and Leia are old friends.” There was a quiet smile on Han’s face, one of fondness. Finn hadn’t the courage to ask, but he knew that Han Solo and Leia Organa were married. Or at least, they were once. If Han wasn’t part of the Resistance, there was a chance they were no longer together. Finn would think if they still were, Han would know how to reach his wife.

“Keep a low profile,” Han continued. “Maz is a bit of an acquired taste. So let me do the talking. And whatever you do, don’t stare.”

Almost in unison, Finn and Rey asked, “At what?”

“Any of it.”

There were no guards at the opened entrance, leading into a small corridor to a large, opened hall full of humans, humanoids, aliens, and droids alike. Lively with chatter, Finn observed eating, gambling, arguing, negotiating, and in one corner, an actual fight.

Suddenly, Han froze to a halt and looked down. Finn and Rey did the same.

“Han Solo!” a tiny, orange-skinned, and wrinkly figure called out. She wore oversized glasses over her eyes, perhaps to help her old eyes see better. 

All activity in the hall briefly stopped as everyone turned to look at the recent arrivals. Finn shifted uncomfortably, hoping the First Order hadn’t put a bounty on his head. A lot of people were staring. _Low profile,_ indeed.

“Maz,” Han sighed.

She peered up at the group, adjusting her goggle-like glasses. “Where’s my boyfriend?”

“Chewie’s repairing the _Falcon.”_

“I always liked that Wookiee,” said Maz. Finn was still trying to decide if she was joking about the boyfriend part or not. “Come! Sit! I can’t wait to hear what you need from me this time.”

She led them to an empty booth big enough for all of them and waved an order of some kind at one of the droid waiters they passed. Soon, they were seated with plates upon plates of food being sat in front of them. 

Finn could say he was hungry from all the running and excitement from the past day; it was nothing compared to Rey’s appetite. She practically inhaled everything she dished up. He wondered when the last decent meal she had was and felt a sudden twinge of guilt. Living on Jakku, she probably wasn’t well-fed. Her body was muscled from years of hard work, but there was hardly a sign of anything but skin and bone on her.

“So, let’s hear it,” Maz began with a sigh. “I heard you're in trouble with a few gangs…” 

“I need you to get this droid to Leia,” Han corrected.

Maz frowned and thought for a moment before she made an offer. “I’ll help you seek passage - Snoke’s hunter squads are looking for you – but this is a task you must do.”

“Leia doesn’t want to see me,” Han said.

“I don’t blame her,” Maz agreed. “But this fight is more than just about you and her. Han, go home.”

Rey stared at her. “What fight?”

“The only fight: against the dark side. Through the ages, I’ve seen evil take many forms. The Sith. The Empire. Today, it is the First Order.”

Finn wanted to laugh. “A fight against the First Order? Good luck. I’ve probably already been spotted.” He stopped when Maz lifted herself on to the table, adjusted her goggles, then crawled right up to him, her face mere inches from his. “Uh… what’s she doing?”

Han replied, “Told you she was an acquired taste.”

Finally, Maz spoke. “I’ve lived a long time, long enough to see the same eyes in different people.” She adjusted her glasses back to normal and sat back. “I’m looking at the eyes of a man who wants to run.”

_Well, she’s not wrong,_ the voice of his conscious replied. The voice that got him into this mess. He wished it would go away.

“You don’t know anything about me,” Finn snapped. “Who I am. What I’ve seen. You don’t know the First Order like I do. They’ll slaughter us. We need to run.

Rey worried her lower lip with her teeth. “Finn, did something happen while you were undercover…?”

Maz paid her no mind. Like Han, she seemed to see right through Finn. “Big head. Red shirt. Shiny gun. Bright red helmet with ear flares. They’re bound for the Outer Rim. Will trade transportation for work. Go.”

He felt himself rise from his seat, suddenly wondering where he should be going. Maz and Han showed him no contempt in their gazes. It was Rey who it hurt to look at.

Reaching for the blaster at his side, he tried to offer it back to the man who gave it to him. Han shook his head. “Keep it, kid.”

It didn’t feel right just to take a blaster from someone, but he didn’t see the point of arguing further either. What he didn’t want to do was look at Rey’s face as he turned to leave. Finn didn’t know what to say to her, so he said nothing at all.

_Now, that’s a little rude,_ the voice sounded like it was offended. _She really liked you, you know?_

“Shut up,” Finn mumbled to himself as he walked over to the captain of the crew Maz pointed out to him.

“I’m told you’re looking for help. I would like a lift to the Outer Rim, if that’s where you're headed. No planet in mind.” He’d figure it out when he got there. All he needed to focus on right now was getting as far away from the First Order’s reach as possible. Wherever the crew was going, they were bound to be heading for some sort of civilization. Finn could lie low for a while, find a job, and start a new life.

The first mate replied to him, but Finn quickly realized there was a language barrier between them. This might make things hard. 

“Great!” he tried to sound enthusiastic. “I have no idea what you just said, but it’s a deal!” The first mate seemed to understand Basic, at least. 

But before he could say any more to the crew, he felt himself being grabbed and pulled to the side.

_“What are you doing?”_ Rey hissed. “You heard what Maz said. You’re part of this fight. We both are.” She searched his face. “You must feel _something.”_

It was time to ‘fess up. He couldn’t lie to her anymore. “I’m not who you think I am.”

Shaking her head slowly, it was apparent that she didn’t understand. “Finn, what are you talking about?”

“I’m not a hero. I’m not Resistance. I’m a stormtrooper.”

She went silent, her face falling. His heart seized in his chest. Just like he knew he would, Finn had let her down.

He continued. “I was taken from a family I’ll never know. Raised to do one thing. To kill. But in my first battle, I made a choice. I chose not to fire on civilians. I wasn’t going to kill for them, so I ran. And I ran right into you. And you looked at me like no one ever had before. I was ashamed of who I was and when you asked if I was in the Resistance, I didn’t want to disappoint you.” For a few hours, Rey’s belief in him had made him a different person. Part of him wanted to be that person, not just for her either. Perhaps she could help him become the person he wanted to be. 

“Rey,” he pleaded. “Come with me.”

She only shook her head. “Don’t go.” 

Feeling his heart sink, he realized he couldn’t force her to run away. This was her choice. “Take care of yourself. _Please.”_ He knew she could handle herself in a fight with primitive weapons, but against the First Order, she wouldn’t stand a chance if they found her. Finn would never be able to sleep again if he ever found out the Order got her.

Trying not to look back at her, Finn went back to the crew. He nodded to them.

“I’m ready to leave whenever you are.”


	5. Chapter 5

As distraught as she was, Rey’s mind almost seemed to be running on autopilot. Finn’s confession left her feeling emotionally drained; she wanted nothing more than to find a quiet corner where she could retreat into herself. She wasn’t upset he was once a stormtrooper – she had a feeling there was something more to Finn’s story from the start. What upset her was that he was leaving. He made all the right choices.... well, maybe lying to her wasn’t that great of a choice, but until now, she thought she had sensed something in him. There was a certain quality about Finn that made her think maybe he wanted to stand up to the First Order after all.

Even with BB-8 at her heels, Rey asked herself why she was here again. She felt like she did back in her first days on Jakku as a small child: lost, alone, and scared. Perhaps that’s where she belonged after all. Saving the galaxy should be left to someone who was more than just a scavenger.

Then, like a comforting warmth, something reached out to her. Calling her.

She followed the call, stopping at a stone staircase that led down to the cellars of the castle. BB-8 chirped to her, but she didn’t answer as she made her first steps down.

At the bottom of the staircase, Rey found herself in a deserted and dark corridor. There was only one door at the end. Reaching out to touch the lock, she found that she couldn’t get in.

In an alcove to her right, crates and boxes were piled high. Dust was collecting on the ones that weren’t covered by a cloth tarp. Some of the objects that were on display for all to see glimmered with gold, making it obvious that they had some value.

On a table sitting deeper in the alcove, a single wooden box caught her eye. She ran her hand over the old wood, still not answering BB-8 who followed her here.

The box wasn’t locked.

Heavy, slow, mechanical breathing filled the room. She turned around to find the source, only to find she was no longer in the castle but in a different, dark corridor. The pristine floors lit up, twisting as she ran further.

Distantly, someone called her name.

A boy about her age emerged from the darkness, startling her. She tripped.

The world around her was nothing but mud and rain. A red lightsaber swiped through the air near her. Rey gasped and moved backwards, looking up at the towering figure in black before he moved towards a burning building. Seven tall, black-cladded figures followed their leader, their weapons drawn and ready for battle.

Then, they vanished and in their place was a small blue and silver R2 unit. She blinked once, thinking the droid looked familiar, but she had seen many R units on Jakku throughout her lifetime.

A new figure approached the droid and fell to his knees. He reached out his hand, one made of metal and plastics, and rested it on the droid’s dome.

Another change of scenery. Snow capped forests sparking with blue and white lights....

 _“Rey…”_ a woman’s voice called.

She turned around, trying to find the source again. Now, she was standing on a cliff overlooking a sea. A man and a woman stood side by side, facing another man, hooded in a gray cloak.

In the woman’s arms was a baby. She clutched it close, her blonde hair whipping around in the wind.

The man next to her place his hand gently on the baby’s white blanket. There were tears in his eyes. The couple embraced, keeping their child between them.

“We love you,” the man told the baby. “We want you to be safe. I hope one day, you’ll understand.”

“Rey, my love,” the woman added. “If we can ever be together again, we will. We’ll come back for you, sweetheart. I promise.”

In tears, they stepped forward, handing the baby off to the cloaked man.

Rey tried to reach her hand out. She remembered the woman’s voice, somehow, even back from when she was that young. But just like the rest of the memories she was seeing, the scene suddenly changed again, leaving her only gripping for thin air.

In darkness she heard the crackle of lightning, followed by a woman’s scream. 

_“I’ll give you one more chance… Where is she?”_

The woman from before was on her knees, the man face-down on black tile. He looked up, defiance in his eyes. “We don’t know.... anymore.”

Feet away from him, a figure in black sat on a throne. Rey could not see his face. A wrinkled, pale hand emerged from the long sleeves of the cloak.

“What a shame. For you.”

Flashes of electricity blinded her.

The sands of Jakku spread as far as she could see. A child was sobbing, Unkar Plutt standing behind her and offering no comfort.

Rey saw herself, the day she was left behind. The little girl clutched her hands on her arms, scared and frightened. She was all alone now.

 _Rey,_ the familiar voice of a man called out. It was not the voice of the other man, the one she had assumed to be her father, after all. _Be brave. Don’t look back._

“Who are you?” she called out, watching her child-self walk towards the dusty outpost. This was not what she remembered. She glanced up at the sky above her, expecting that any moment, she would see a ship ascend. That was what she had replayed in her mind over and over for years. She begged her parents to come back, and they left in their ship.

There was nothing but clear blue above her. The sun glowed red overhead as the sky darkened. The light turning into a bloody red.

Then, she was in the underground alcove again, on her knees and panting. She looked up to see the petite figure of Maz Kanata watching her.

“What was that?” she stammered as BB-8 rolled over to her. “I shouldn’t have come down here. I’m sorry.”

“It called to you,” Maz said, partly amazed and also not surprised.

Looking at the overturned box on the ground, a cylindrical metal tube rolled partly out of it until it was stopped by one of its flat metal parts sticking out at the top.

“I need to get back to—"

“Jakku,” Maz finished for her. “Han told me.” She reached down to pick up the tube and held it with care. Suddenly, he demeanor changed to gentleness. “My dear, whoever you’re waiting for, they’re not coming back. I can see it in your eyes: you’ve always known that.”

Sighing, Rey picked herself up and said nothing in response. Perhaps she had. Fourteen years was a long time. Still, all that time she held hope that one day, her family would find her.

“But there is someone who still could.”

A tear ran down her face. She knew who Maz was talking about, but the thought hurt too much. _This_ was too much.

Maz continued, “This lightsaber was Luke’s. And his father’s before him. And now, it calls to _you.”_ She held the tube out like an offering. “The belonging you seek not behind you, it’s ahead.”

More tears. “I think I know who I am now. Maybe. I was adopted and my biological parents are dead. And then my adopted father left me.”

“There may be more to this story,” Maz hinted. “I’m no Jedi, but I know the Force. It moves through and surrounds every living thing. When I close my eyes, I feel it. The light is always there. Sometimes, it helps me see the truth.” She held her hands out again. “It will guide you. The saber. Take it.”

Rey wiped the tears away. “I’m never touching that thing again! I don’t want any part of this.”

She took off running, up the stairs and away from the relic that showed her everything she had wanted to know and everything she didn’t. 

Finding another quiet corner in the castle, Rey finally stopped. She slumped against the stone wall and slid down, curling into herself. A familiar chirp arrived a few minutes later.

“It’s nothing, BB-8.”

Well, that was far from the truth, but she rather not talk about it. No one had wanted her. Why else would she have been left on Jakku? Whoever adopted her – and she had a suspicion she knew who now – they left her, never to return. Those voices she heard were distant memories, an echo of the past. She convinced herself they were the voices of parents who would return for her. Anything would have been better than the truth. 

And Maz wanted her to go back to someone who abandoned her? Why should she even consider it? He wanted nothing to do with her, and Rey wanted nothing to do with him.

 _There’s more to this story,_ the voice she had heard in her head for all these years – a man’s voice, but not her father’s – repeated.

Who are you? She asked it but received no response.

* * *

After a while – it might have been hours, it might have been just minutes – Rey wiped her tears away and stood up. The entire time, BB-8 stayed by her side. For a droid with a self-preservation order in process, he certainly was very loyal to his friends. Poe Dameron must have been a good partner to him.

She searched for Han, finding he was no longer in the castle and guessed he went back to the _Falcon._ The landing area was a lot livelier this time around. Crews were prepping for the next step of their journey, refueling and loading supplies. Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted Finn helping with a large crate. Stopping, she watched him for a moment, remembering his offer. She had never had another human friend before, and she thought of Finn as the closest thing she had ever gotten to. Maybe the offer was still open.

Crouching down, she touched the droid on his head. “You know the way back to the _Falcon,_ right?”

BB-8 chirped an affirmative, but then asked her where she was going. Rey didn’t give a full answer.

“Han will get you to the Resistance. I’m not going with you. I’m sorry, BB-8, but I’m not strong enough.” Then she turned away, trying hard not to think that she just did to the droid what her adopted father did to her. 

Rey called out to Finn, making him pause in his task. He looked surprised to see her there.

“Is something wrong?” he asked. “Where’s BB-8?”

“He’s going back to the _Falcon.”_ She swallowed; her throat felt thick. “Is your offer still open?”

A small, but genuine smile spread on his face. It made her feel warm on the inside. “The Outer Rim will be safer,” he promised. “Rey, I want you to be with me."

For some odd reason, she almost felt like she could burst into tears. Taking a deep breath, she nodded. “Let’s go, then. Should we talk to the captain first?”

Finn glanced around until he spotted the red-helmeted first mate. “I’ll let them know you’re coming too. They’ll probably like having a mechanic on board.”

But just as he took a step forward, he suddenly paused, his brow furrowing in confusion. She was just about to ask him if he was feeling well when she felt a sudden tug in the pit of her stomach. Something was wrong, but she wasn’t sure what.

Around them, the crowd in the landing area all looked towards the sky. She followed their eyes, seeing a bright light seeping through the atmosphere. It was bright enough to be visible in daytime. Rey thought, perhaps, a star had gone nova.

“The First Order,” Finn breathed fearfully. “They’ve done it.”

“Done what?” she asked, though she was almost afraid to hear his answer.

However, Finn was already walking away. “I gotta find Han,” he told her. “Gotta tell him—” A moment later, he vanished behind the ship.

Not sure what to do, Rey stood back and watched the crew work. She thought about talking to the captain herself and explain she was with Finn. There was more she could offer than just lifting crates.

Shouts echoed through the landing pad, people pointing back at the sky. What now? She followed everyone’s eyes again.

A fleet of ships, dark and menacing, approached for landing. On the landing pad, everyone hurried up, trying to scramble everything they could for immediate takeoff. Crews were even abandoning supplies to hurry away.

She knew the signs of grave news when she saw it. Head turning, she searched the chaos for Finn. There wasn’t much time left. The crew was about to leave, with or without them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And now, we are getting to the part where there are some actual changes to the story!


	6. Chapter 6

Finn shakily gripped the metal tube in his hand. In mere moments, Maz’s castle had been reduced to rubble. They took cover under a still-standing stone wall, looking over the situation. Flying overhead, the First Order was shooting at any structure or ship it could see. Finn knew this was one of their typical starting attack actions. Next, they would begin to land to deploy ground troops.

Maz turned to him. “Go. Find your friend,” she shouted.

“I need a weapon!” He had placed his blaster down in the ship he was going to depart in while he worked.

Grabbing his wrist, Maz raised the tube upward. “You have one!”

There was a switch box on the side of it; Finn pressed his finger against it. A flicker of blue light shot out from the opening, creating a lethal blade.

A lightsaber.

He wasn’t sure how well he’d be with this kind of weapon, being far more used to blasters and long-range weapons.

But there was no time to hesitate. The first stormtrooper he encountered on the ground was firing on them. Han, Chewbacca, and Maz returned to cover, shooting at the oncoming soldiers. Finn, however, charged head on. It probably wasn’t the smartest thing to do without the right protection, but he didn’t have much choice.

The saber ran through armor with little force. It shocked him at first to see the blade appear through the other side of the stormtrooper’s chest, but there wasn’t time to think about that either. Rey was out there somewhere and Maz wanted her to have this lightsaber. He wasn’t sure why, but it seemed important. Han even recognized the weapon.

He found her quickly enough, blaster drawn and panicking. As small as the blaster was, it had limited ammunition. She was smart enough to wait until she got close enough for a sure shot before she pulled the trigger. 

A stormtrooper crept up behind her and Finn sprinted towards them. He was going to be too late…

Panicked, Rey spun around and threw up her hand in front of her, creating a blast that pushed the stormtrooper back and knocked him to the ground. Finn almost forgot she could do that.

Finishing off the ‘trooper, he looked around for more soldiers. “Are you all right?” he called to her.

“Fine,” she replied. “The crew took off without us.”

“You should have gone with them.”

“I wasn’t leaving without you!” 

It hadn’t been a wise move on her part, but Finn felt gratitude that she still wanted to be around him. He wouldn’t have blamed her if she hadn’t forgiven him for lying.

“Maz wants you to have this.” He held the lightsaber out to her. Frowning, she shook her head.

“Keep it,” she told him. “I have my own way to fight.”

Another stormtrooper approached them. Finn noticed he was staring at him intently. Without a helmet, he couldn’t see their call signs. 

“Traitor,” he shouted before he dropped his blaster and retrieved a riot baton. Finn thought he recognized the voice, but couldn’t place a name. Whoever it was, it was someone who had been close enough in quarters to know what Finn had looked like underneath the armor. Only a handful of soldiers would know.

Gripping the lightsaber, Finn stood his ground as the stormtrooper charged at him. Whoever he was, he was big, strong, and agile. Between the vibro-baton and the lightsaber, they both had their work cut out for them. Each strike was met with a matched defense. Obviously, the stormtrooper wasn’t going to take the danger of facing a lightsaber in combat lightly. 

He thought his luck was running out when he made a wrong step and his leg sunk to the ground. The stormtrooper held his baton high, ready to bring it down on Finn. One last attempt for defense, he held the lightsaber so the blade was ready to try to deflect the attack.

But as luck had it, he had Rey.

Fumbling forward from a sudden, invisible push, the stormtrooper fell right onto the blade, impaling himself through the chest. Finn pushed him away, letting the body roll to the ground and watched as the helmet came loose and rolled away.

The staring brown eyes of FN-2199 looked up at him. Finn jumped away from the body, wanting to get as far away as possible. He felt sick. This stormtrooper had once been a cadet that shared a barrack with him. Back then, everyone called him Nines.

And Finn had killed him.

Sinking to his knees, he looked away and tried to breathe deeply. Han was racing over, blaster in hand, with Chewbacca covering him.

“You okay, big deal?”

He reached down and with unexpected strength, helped Finn back to his feet. Staring down at the stormtrooper on the ground, Han frowned before he looked back at Finn.

“Hey now, you did what you had to do.”

They were interrupted by a dozen stormtroopers, weapons aimed, as they found themselves surrounded. Han started to draw his weapon but halted after he took account of how outnumbered they words. The odds were stacked against them.

“Any ideas?” he mumbled to Chewie. The Wookiee replied, but Finn couldn’t begin to think what he was saying. 

“Drop your weapons!” the stormtrooper leader ordered. 

Just as Finn was about to let got of the lightsaber, a squadron of X-wings appeared overhead. Over the lake, they shot down First Order craft, causing the stormtroopers on the ground to look to see what had just swooped in.

Han saw his chance. Drawing his blaster from the ground, he shot at their captors. Chewbacca and Finn followed his lead.

Leading the X-wings, a starcraft marked in black and orange swooped in closer. Targeting the First Order, their craft, and their soldiers, the pilot shot at each one with efficiency. It was almost graceful to watch. 

“That’s one helluva pilot!” Finn cheered. He waved at the X-wings as they passed by.

"Sure is,” Han agreed. “Now how about you admire them from cover, huh?”

From behind another stoned wall, Finn took their surroundings in. Their X-wing flying saviors were handling the situation well. Most of the stormtroopers were down, their transport and heavy weapons destroyed. He turned to Han and Chewbacca and found that neither of them had been hurt this time.

But someone was missing. He scanned over the area, but couldn’t find the one person he wanted more than anything to be safe.

Looking out again, Finn searched for any sign of Rey. In the fighting, he had lost sight of her. Gulping nervously, he started looking for her among the bodies on the ground.

“Have you seen Rey?” he asked the two hiding with him.

"Not since before you went to talk to that crew.”

A black First Order transport landed in one of the few clearings left and waited. No one was coming out to aid the ground troops. Confused, Finn searched the area again until he spotted a figure in black appear from the edge of the forest.

Kylo Ren. Fear overtook Finn and the sight. He still remembered how even though he couldn’t see the man’s eyes, they always seemed to be staring at him when they were in proximity of each other.

There was someone in his arms, limp and unconscious.

“REY!!!”

Ignoring what remained of the battle around him, Finn raced towards the shuttle, only to find he was too late. The figure vanished into the shuttle and it immediately took off.

Rey was gone and Kylo Ren had her.

The remaining First Order craft loaded up and took off moments later. Everyone who was left behind was on their own. 

Emerging from the forest, BB-8 rolled as fast as his motors would allow him. The little droid scanned the area before he approached Finn and beeped something to him.

“She’s gone,” Finn told the droid. Hot tears were warming his cheeks. He wasn’t sure if that was what BB-8 was trying to communicate anyway. “They took her.”

Han was approaching now, but he wasn’t focused on Finn. 

“They took her!” Finn shouted to him. “Did you see that? They took Rey!”

Pushing Finn aside, Han didn’t reply. Too shocked to respond, Finn spotted Maz Kanata speaking to BB-8 a few feet away.

“Don’t give up hope,” she tried to soothe the droid. BB-8 continued to beep forlornly. “Go. Your people need you. Maybe they can help you get her back.”

Finn walked over to her, passing by BB-8. Looking up, Maz glanced at the young man in front of her and began to adjust her googles.

“What now?” Finn groaned.

She smiled. “Now, I see the eyes of a warrior.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A short chapter here, with a few changes that I thought was appropriate.
> 
> See you next week!


	7. Chapter 7

Like Takodana, D’Qar was vibrant and green, with trees so tall they almost seemed to scrape the blue sky. It was a quiet world, uninhabited except for the native wildlife. The grassy hills and mounds of the world were a perfect place to build hangars and barracks. It was perfect for the Resistance to hide.

The moment the _Falcon_ touched down and the ramp was released, Finn explored the base. It wasn’t as metallic and sterile as a First Order base, but the soldiers seemed just as organized. He didn’t know where to go, so he stood awkwardly near Solo’s freighter. 

An X-wing landed gracefully nearby. The black and orange one that led the squadron on Takodana. Curiously, Finn tilted his head to watch the pilot exit the cockpit, only distracted by BB-8 rolling at full speed past him.

Helmet removed, Finn almost couldn’t believe the sight in front of him.

Poe Dameron. Alive.

Kneeling down, Poe’s smile was bright as he was reunited with his droid. He spoke to the droid, looking up and around when BB-8 chirped something to him.

Their eyes met. Poe looked just as overwhelmed at seeing Finn as Finn was seeing him.

Running towards each other, the two men embraced, happy to see they both made it off Jakku. 

“Poe Dameron, you’re alive!”

“So are you!”

There was a cut across Poe’s cheek, under his eye. He looked exhausted, but he didn’t look too banged up. Eyebrows furrowed, Poe looked over Finn’s choice of clothing. “That’s my jacket.”

“Oh, sorry.” Finn started to slip out of it but Poe stopped him.

“No, no. Keep it. It suits you.” Poe grinned, but his tone was more somber. “You completed my mission, Finn. You’re a good man. The Resistance could use more people like you.”

Finn didn’t feel like such an outstanding person at the moment. There was a lot he did wrong between Jakku and here. 

And Rey was still out there.

“Poe, I need your help.”

The pilot nodded. “Anything.”

“I need to speak with General Organa. Can you do that for me?”

* * *

Poe took him to the lower levels of the command center, built into one of the hills. Everyone they passed was on high alert, something that had begun since Starkiller fired on the New Republic.

Inside the conference room, General Organa was chatting with several Resistance officers from various duties and ranks. It shocked Finn that the petite woman in the center of the room was Leia Organa, princess of the doomed Alderaan and a leading force of the Rebellion. 

When they entered, everyone stared at the recent arrivals. Not taken aback by the looks, Poe marched right up to Leia.

“General Organa, sorry to interrupt but…” He motioned Finn over to them. “This is Finn, and he needs to talk to you.”

“And I need to talk to him,” she turned to the newcomer and to his shock, took his hand firmly, but not roughly. “That was incredibly brave, what you did. Renouncing the Order, saving this man’s life.” She looked at Poe, who nodded his agreement. He must have told her what had happened on the _Finalizer._

But none of that mattered, he had more pressing matters to focus on.

“Thank you, ma’am, but I wanted to talk to you about a friend of mine who was taken captive by the First Order on Takodana.”

Kylo Ren had her, he wanted to add, but he wasn’t sure that would do much good. They might not even consider a rescue attempt if they knew Rey was a prisoner of Snoke’s right-hand man.

To his surprise, General Organa nodded sympathetically. “Han told me about the girl. I’m so sorry. I would like to help you, but right now, we’re in the middle of a crisis and we have to focus on that.”

Almost like he was rescuing Finn, Poe jumped in. “Finn said he’s familiar with the superweapon that destroyed the Hosnian System. He worked on the world where it’s based.”

Leia’s eyes widened. “You _worked_ on it?”

“Well,” Finn admitted, the truth would serve him well here. “I was just a cadet at the time. They had all of us on cleaning crew.” He tried not to think of the extermination duties he was given back then. Guilt had made him risk his life to relocate a native species to a new home. “But they gave us some tech training on the base. So, I can’t tell you the science of it, but I can tell you the basics of what it does and where it is.”

“We’re desperate for anything you can give us,” she told him.

“I can tell you the location of the world and I’ll try to help you as much as I can. I’m pretty sure that’s where they’ve taken my friend, so I need to get there. Fast.”

The General’s look softened. “We’ll try to help you. Tell me what you can about her so we can try to locate her. What’s her name?”

“Rey.” Even just saying her name made him feel emotional. He never wanted this to happen to her. It was his fault.

“Rey,” Leia’s voice shook, though Finn didn’t understand why. She had been so strong in her communication earlier. “Is there a last name?”

“She never told me one. I think she’s an orphan.”

“Anything else you can tell us about her?”

Swallowing, Finn thought about her powers, how they reminded him so much of the man who took her. He had promised her he wouldn’t tell anyone what he saw her do on the Ervana. “She has dark brown hair, freckles on her face, hazel eyes.” He tried to envision what she had been wearing. “Last I saw her, her hair was up in three buns and she wore worn-out clothes. Some of the material draped. She’s a scavenger from Jakku.”

Her expression dulled but she nodded. “We’ll make sure to keep our eye out for her. Launch a rescue effort alongside an attack. I can’t make any promises but… we’ll try.”

That was more than Finn expected they would offer. If they had to attack Starkiller Base, there was no promise that Rey would make it off alive, _if_ she was even alive now. He would go with the rescue effort personally, to make sure no corridor was left unchecked. Finn felt like he owed that to her.

An Aqualish entered the room and everyone except General Organa stood at attention. Finn squinted, believing he had seen him before. If he were correct, this was probably the legendary Admiral Ackbar. 

Through his wide-set eyes, Ackbar looked at Finn. “Young man, come with me. I have a great many questions to ask you.”

* * *

With Finn gone into the other room, General Organa sat down with a sigh. She folded her hands in her lap and thought about everything that had come up in the last few hours. A declaration of war had been made by the First Order, a star system destroyed with millions of lives snuffed out, a victory won on Takodana, and her husband’s sudden return.

And now, an ex-stormtrooper was giving them the help they were desperate for. She couldn’t help the feeling, and a part of her insisted this was just wishful thinking, but he seemed _so familiar._

There were more important matters to attend to, but her heart told her she needed to follow it.

Her daughter stood behind her, a questioning and worried frown on her face. Han had insisted Kaydel resembled Leia in the face and figure, but they had never been sure about the darker shade of blonde her hair took to. It was probably also from her side of the family. Luke’s hair had been a similar shade and after years of searching, they had finally found a photo of their biological father before he became the dreaded Darth Vader and knew who Luke got it from.

“Mom?” she asked. 

“Can you send Lando a message for me?” Kay was young, but she had proved talented with technology from an early age. Already, by the age of 21, she had served a successful career in Fleet Command and was now working in Operations Control. Leia had thought she wouldn’t want to work so close to her mother, but Kay insisted on the change. At least it gave Leia a chance to keep an eye on her, which was one less thing to worry about.

She nodded and waited for her mother’s message.

“Tell him when there’s a more appropriate time for it, there’s someone I’d like him to meet.”

There was a question in her daughter’s gaze, but whatever was on her mind, she didn’t ask. Instead, she retreated to her console.

Leia didn’t need to look to know her estranged husband had walked into the room. He didn’t enter her line of sight, so she assumed he was standing around awkwardly.

“You don’t have to stand there, Han,” she said.

He moved closer. “Didn’t want to bother you. I know you’re busy.”

“Yes, we’re in the middle of potential annihilation, but we still have time to talk.”

“I wanted to see you and Kay.”

While it had been years since the last time Han and Leia saw one another, he and Kaydel frequently made trips to visit. It had been a difficult five years for everyone.

“I’m glad you found Finn,” she started. “He’s given us more intel in a few minutes than we’ve been able to gather in months.”

“He’s a good kid,” Han promised. “Terrible liar though.”

Leia chuckled. “I think he’s given up on that, luckily. I feel awful about his friend though.”

“She has the Force, Leia,” he told her. With all that had gone on in the last few hours, he hadn’t time to tell her this bit of information. “And I just can’t help but to think… Well, it’s probably just a coincidence. Finn can use Luke’s old lightsaber, so maybe he can too.”

“I can’t believe after all these years, it’s resurfaced.” Leia would have to ask Maz Kanata how she found it. Everyone thought it had been lost forever on Bespin.

Kaydel returned to the center of the room and Han stood up to embrace her. They smiled, but the weight of the galaxy fell upon them quickly.

“Mom said you saw him…?”

“Yeah, kiddo, I did. He took Finn’s friend,” he said this louder so Leia could hear him. “I’m not sure exactly why he took her, but my bet is she was only alive because she can use the Force.”

Nodding, Leia closed her eyes and agreed. “I’m not sure, but that could very well be likely.” She glanced at the little BB unit rolling up to a powered-down R2-D2, C-3PO speaking to him. “I would have thought he’d go after BB-8.” 

“That’s what I thought too.”

A slight glint of hope twinkled in Kay’s brown eyes. “Maybe he doesn’t want to go after Uncle Luke after all…”

Han sighed. “Kay, I know you want that, but you didn’t see him like I did. He’s not coming back. He’s one of them. Even if he came back, he could never walk free. Not after all he's done.”

She seemed to understand this, even if her heart wished for something else. As if to distract herself, Kay turned back to a console and lowered her head as she stared blankly at the screen. Leia’s heart broke at the sight of that twinkle dulling.


	8. Chapter 8

Rey woke, trying to push away a restraint which held her upright. Groggy and disoriented, she thought she was alone at first until she saw the figure in black standing in the corner of the room, still and statue-like.

He had brought her here, attacked her and taken her from her friends. Of course, she put up a fight, their abilities similarly matched, but he was far more experienced with his powers than her. Like her, he could manipulate the environment around her with an unseen power, even move her around like a puppet if he wished. He held her still, making it impossible to move or breathe before he somehow broke into her mind and saw her memory of the map to Skywalker. It had hurt far worse than any headache she had ever experienced.

_“It’s you, isn’t it?”_ the man in front of her had asked. Still confused by his question, Rey wondered if she was brought in as a case of mistaken identity.

If it hadn’t been for her power stirring up his curiosity, she probably would have been dead by now.

Wherever he had taken her, it was a far-cry from the forests of Takodana. The walls were metallic and heavily lit, making the room look almost white and too clean. This must be a First Order facility, but where she was exactly and how long she was out was beyond her guess.

“Where am I?” she demanded.

“Does it matter?” There was less hostility in his voice than she would have expected. “You’re my guest.”

And then, with a wave of his hand, he removed the restraints.

“Where are the others?” Rey asked.

“You mean, the traitors, murderers, and thieves you call friends?” She didn’t like his tone; he thought he was above her. In Rey’s mind, anyone working for the First Order was far from it. They were bullies whenever they showed up on Jakku. She admired Finn for turning away from them, even if that was all he’d ever known. 

The man in black continued. “You’ll be relieved to hear I have no idea.”

He seemed calm, but Rey knew men like this. They were calm as long as they were in control. The moment something didn’t go to his plan, the moment she didn’t adhere to whatever rules he believed were established silently between them, he would be set off. Something told her it wouldn’t be hard.

_Be very careful,_ Rey, the voice she had heard for all these years warned her. It was imaginary, just her conscious, she reminded herself. There wasn’t anything wrong with it having a different voice, after all, she had been alone for so long. Still, it would do her good to listen to it right now.

The man circled her, keeping his hidden eyes on her expression. “You still want to kill me.”

Despite her own advice, she mumbled, “That happens when you’re being hunted by a creature in a mask.”

She thought this would be what triggered him, but instead, he reached up, unlatched the mask, and sat it down. The face, once hidden, was like many she had seen before. The only thing that made her think otherwise was the intensity of his gaze. It reminded her of creatures of Jakku that hunted at night. 

But, like when she met Finn, there was something that tugged at her when she looked at him. A sense of familiarity. 

“Are you really just a scavenger?” he asked. The man didn’t seem to believe it, but when she said nothing, he changed the subject. “Tell me about the droid.”

Rey didn’t know where BB-8 was, but perhaps she could buy him more time. “It’s a BB-unit with a selenium drive and a—”

“—thermal hyperscan vindicator,” the man finished for her. “I am familiar with the droid’s general functions. What I want,” he growled, “is what’s stored in its memory.”

She looked away from him. She would never tell him what he wanted.

“I know you’ve seen the map! Now we can make this easy, or we can make this difficult. I can take whatever I want.”

Defiance fueled her. “Then why don’t you?”

He stood over her and sighed. “I would prefer not to do this.” It almost was like he was giving her a chance to reconsider, but brought his hand in front of her face while he spoke. 

Like back on Takodana, he probed her mind, attempting to break into her memory. She tried to empty her mind, hide what she knew, and when the familiar ache of pain ripped through her head, she tried something else. Tried to imagine something to throw him off.

“You’ve been so lonely,” he mumbled. “So afraid to leave. Convinced someone wanted you.” He smiled, satisfied of her internal suffering. “At night, desperate to sleep, you dream of an ocean. An island.”

She tried to move her legs, to kick him, but was met only by restraints. 

“And Han Solo, like the father you never had.” He shook his head, but still smirked. “I’ll tell you something: he would have been a disappointment.”

“Get out of my head!” she panted.

“Show me the map!”

Somehow, she found in herself the strength to fight back. “I’m not giving you anything!”

“We’ll see.” He stared at her, straight in the eyes and pressed harder until something made him come to a halt.

Suddenly, Rey’s mind’s eye warped. She saw who he was, a killer who hid his face behind a mask. Saw him kill hundreds before her, many in the same chair she sat in. This was Kylo Ren, a man she had heard many things about but thought could easily be a myth.

And then she saw him sitting on a throne, the galaxy at his feet, before it pulled away and his fear flooded her senses.

She saw another mask, melted and charred. It sat in ashes.

“You,” she breathed. _“You’re_ afraid. That you’ll never be as strong as Darth Vader!”

Pulling his hand away sharply, a gasp in his throat. Stumbling back, he glanced at her for one quick moment before he waved his hand again and the restraints returned around her wrist.

“Who are you?” he demanded, then he shook his head. “Never mind, I know exactly who you are.”

And again, she said nothing. Turning away, he picked up his mask and situated it over his head before he moved to exit the room.

Somehow, she knew exactly who he was too.

“Ben Organa!” she shouted after him but could not get him to appear again. Disgust sat on her tongue as she said his name. How could the son of Han Solo fall so low? 

Alone, she lay still on the chair, pondering what had just happened. She had resisted him, keeping the map safe in her head and buying the Resistance more time. That power that rested under the surface surged and helped her in ways she wasn’t sure she would ever understand.

His mind had been a horrible place, filled with hatred and anger and held together by a longing for total power. There was blood on his hands, but fear that all the atrocities he had already done wasn’t enough.

If Rey wasn’t careful, she’d be yet another number on his body count.

A stormtrooper guard entered the cell and stopped in front of the door. He was here to make sure she was behaving.

That was decidedly what she wasn’t going to do. 

_“You!”_ she called to grab his attention.

He turned towards her, impatiently. “What, scavenger scum?”

She felt her mind become distant, but her voice was commanding. _“You will remove these restraints. And leave this cell, with the door open, and retire to your quarters. You will not speak of this to anyone.”_


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What's this? A Kylo Ren chapter? It's more likely than you think.

Ren was breathing hard as he stood outside the cell. Behind his eyes, his head ached. The whole encounter with the scavenger was disturbing. It shouldn’t have had to come to this. He was stronger than her, far more experienced with the Force.

But she was more than she appeared to be. Back on Takodana, when he saw the girl fighting off stormtroopers with nothing but the sheer power of the Force, he knew there was something special about her. His probing only confirmed this. Not only that, but he recognized her as someone he knew a long time ago, in another lifetime. 

The moment she recalled his name, one he shed years before and rarely thought of again, he realized that she remembered him too.

And that made her all the more dangerous.

A stormtrooper marched down the corridor, right at him. Ren quickly straightened his posture and controlled his breathing.

“Sir, the Supreme Leader has requested your presence.”

Nodding, Ren allowed himself to be escorted away by this soldier.

The assembly chamber was dark and empty when he stepped inside. It could easily sit 400 officers in a circle around the raised platform in the center. Ren never sat during these meetings, if he even attended. He would much rather stand back and note the behavior of each person in the room. 

The scavenger was friends with the traitor, FN-2187. Had Ren the time back on Takodana, he would have brought the defector in for questioning, before a swift execution. It had only been recently that he had frequently been around the soldier, but each time they crossed paths, FN-2187’s actions were often not in the best interest of the First Order. He questioned his orders, often carrying them out with reluctance. A quick search into his record confirmed Ren’s suspicion that the defect in the soldier dug deeper. His birth world and bloodline carried a history of rebellion. Ren had seen him on Jakku defying his orders by not carrying out the extermination of a hostile village, giving the excuse of a defective blaster.

Sometimes, stormtroopers got grandiose and useless thoughts. The Order always saw they got back in line. If Ren hadn’t been so preoccupied by the Resistance pilot, he would have personally marched FN-2187 straight to reconditioning. 

The platform flickered before the enormous projection of Supreme Leader Snoke filled it.

“The map?” he demanded.

There were few people Ren had the slightest fear of, and Snoke was one of them. His master and trainer, Snoke knew many things about the dark side which Ren still did not. He was old and growing weaker – something that gave Ren a sense of calm, knowing Snoke wouldn’t be forever – but he still could kill his apprentice if he grew bored and frustrated with him.

Ren gulped. “The scavenger…” he began. “I couldn’t see it. She resisted me.”

Snoke grew furious. “Resisted you! This scavenger—this _girl_ —resisted _you?”_ And though there was fury in his eyes, the Supreme Leader was also curious.

“She is strong in the Force. Untrained, yes, but stronger than she knows.” He thought, perhaps, he should tell his master who the girl was.

 _It would be wise to keep that to yourself,_ his guiding voice advised, and Ren listened. This shadow had always watched over him, whispered promises of power and glory to him. In his lifetime, he had heard many voices speak to him, even the Supreme Leader himself, but this voice, he had chosen to follow. This was his true master.

Observing the Knight of Ren, Snoke glared. “It isn’t her strength that is causing my failure. It’s _your weakness._ Where is the droid?”

Another voice entered the room. “Ren believed it was no longer of value to us.” 

Kylo didn’t need to turn around to know who it was. He could practically imagine the exact smirk General Hux had on his face right now.

“He believed the girl was all we needed,” he continued. “That he could obtain everything we needed from her. As a result, though we cannot confirm this, we believe the droid has been returned to the hands of our enemy.”

With each statement, Snoke’s anger grew, but his tone remained unchanged. “Have we located the Resistance base?”

“Luckily for us, we spotted a reconnaissance ship approaching Starkiller.” Hux grinned. “And we followed it back to the Ileenium system. As we speak, my officers are pinpointing an exact location.”

Ren had the urge to run the general through with his lightsaber where he stood. Every victory for Hux was a failure for Ren. If Snoke saw that Kylo Ren wasn’t as efficient as he was trained to be, or even compare him to General Hux, it would spell danger for the leader of the Knights of Ren. 

And Snoke was pleased with this news. “Call the search off. Prepare the weapon. We’ll just destroy the whole system.”

Hux’s composure wavered, but he feigned not to be surprised. “The whole system, Supreme Leader? The Ileenium system has at least three inhabitable worlds that would serve well for First Order use. It seems a little—” 

“Do not question my orders!” Snoke boomed. “The Resistance cannot find Skywalker before us.”

Even if he didn’t like Hux, Ren found he agreed with him on this. The Hosnian system had to be destroyed, for it was crawling with the scum of the New Republic. The rest of the galaxy, however, had potential to serve the First Order. It sounded like the Ileenium System wasn’t inhabited except for the world wherever the Resistance hid their base. That world could be sacrificed, but the rest would be a marvelous opportunity to extract natural resources.

“Supreme Leader, I can get the map from the girl. That will be the end of that. I just need your guidance.”

Snoke made it clear his word was law. “I have given you my guidance plenty of times. And you promised me when it came to destroying the Resistance you wouldn’t fail me. Your judgement is clouded, Kylo Ren. Your past and desires control you.” He then addressed Hux. “Destroy the system. With it gone, so we will end the fight over this supposed map to Skywalker. Better the enemy not have at all, even if we don’t either.

“Yes, Supreme Leader!”

Hux strode out of the room, tall and pleased with himself. Under his helmet, Ren rolled his eyes but paused when he felt Snoke’s eyes on him.

“I was hoping you were ready for the next step in your training,” he said. “It appears I was wrong and that a reminder is in order. _Bring the girl to me.”_


	10. Chapter 10

Finn’s stomach was doing summersaults.

“We’re going to make our landing approach at _lightspeed?_ Am I hearing you right?”

In front of him, in the co-pilot’s chair, Chewbacca make a breathy laugh.

Han made no comment to Finn as he smiled and stared straight ahead. “I’d sit down if I were you,” he warned him. “Chewie, get ready.”

Knowing Han wasn’t joking, Finn scrambled for his seat again and buckled in. He wished he had time to run through the _Falcon,_ strip the freighter of every kind of padding he could find, and pile it in front of him.

Used to lightspeed travel, he had never felt sick before. Now, he was sure he was going to vomit.

“And…” Han followed a meter on the console. “Now!”

Gravity pulled on the freighter as they ripped through Starkiller’s shields and slowed at an incredible rate. The alarms went off, flashing red inside. Finn could see the familiar snow-covered forests as they flew just over the tops of pine trees.

Chewbacca howled at Han.

“I _am_ pulling up!”

They began to hit trees as they descended downward. Han fiddled with the controls, trying to bring them slightly upward until, on accident, the _Falcon_ shot up in the air again.

“Any higher, they’ll see us!” he shouted.

Finn wanted to tell him that on a First Order base, there was surveillance everywhere. Likely, they had already been seen. Perhaps, though, they would get lucky and the Order’s arrogance would have made them believe their shields were impenetrable and they only focused their surveillance efforts on space.

His stomach churned again as they dropped down. Han and Chewie fought to keep them level as they slowed, but they continued to hit trees, splinters of wood and streams of snow flying around them outside the viewports.

It was the snow that brought them to a halt. Fresh and soft, it was the best thing they could have hoped for, though the _Falcon_ quickly became half-buried in it.

* * *

It didn’t seem like surveillance picked up on their intrusion and thanks to the forests and snow, a patrol unit didn’t spot the three as they approached the outmost exterior wall of the base.

“There’s a flood tunnel over that ridge.” Finn pointed. “We can get in that way.”

Han’s brows knitted together. “Exactly what did you do here, kid?”

“Sanitation.”

_“Sanitation!”_ Han growled. 

“All the cadets had to serve at some point.”

“Look, I get that,” Han rolled his eyes, “that you weren’t exactly an officer or anything. You’ve helped out a lot already. But how do you know how to take down the shields if you were just a cadet here.”

Finn knew he wasn’t going to be able to lie to Han. He was far too good at knowing when someone was lying. “Only certain officers have access to the codes,” he replied. “That’s all I know. Really, I’m just here to get Rey,” he admitted.

“Anything else you forgot to tell us? There are people counting on us.” 

Before they left, the Resistance learned D’Qar was Starkiller’s next target. It would take time for the weapon to charge, but if this group of three didn’t get the shields down to lead the strike effort… Well, at least the Resistance had already called an evacuation of the base.

“Han,” Finn tried to assure him. “We’ll figure it out.”

_Trust the Force,_ that familiar voice echoed in his head. Finn wasn’t really sure what the Force was, but now he knew that somehow, it was connected to Rey. His fingertips brushed the lightsaber secured to his belt by a D-ring.

“We’ll use the Force!” he echoed out loud.

Han rolled his eyes. “Look kid, I haven’t got time to explain this all to you but… _that’s not how the Force works!”_

_Actually…_

Finn ignored the voice this time. Whatever it wanted to suggest, he was pretty sure Han wasn’t in the mood to listen.

* * *

“The less time spent here,” Han whispered as they peered down an empty corridor inside the base, “the better luck we’re going to have.”

Finn checked the corner one more time before he gestured to Han and Chewbacca to follow him. “I have an idea.”

With careful planning and quiet footsteps, the three made considerable distance inside. Finn knew what to listen for: the sound of footsteps on the smooth surface of the floor, a droid’s quiet beeps or the soft sound of a motor running. He spent many nights alone patrolling quiet corridors, and even though back then he wasn’t observing for a potential future break-in, his mind studied everything in the environment as he encountered it.

A figure was coming towards them, her boots making a metallic clank against the floor. Without peering around the corner, Finn knew exactly who it was and found an alcove for them to hide in.

“Here comes our key,” he mumbled. “We need her alive.”

“Old friend of yours?” Han guessed.

“Something like that.”

Highly reflective chromium armor made its way down the corridor. Draped across one shoulder, a black cape, bordered with red, trailed behind her.

“Is there a stun setting?” Finn asked as the figure drew closer. He wasn’t familiar with the blaster model in his hands.

Han grinned. “We got something else we can use.” He looked at Chewie, who nodded.

No one saw a massive, furry arm wrap around Captain Phasma. No one saw her being pulled inside an empty room against her will. She struggled against her captor until she turned around and found blasters aimed at her head.

“Captain Phasma, remember me?” Finn asked with a grin that rivaled Han’s. He tilted his blasted slightly. “Still wanna inspect my blaster?”

“FN-2187,” she sniffed, keeping her dignity about her.

“Not anymore. Name’s Finn. And I’m in charge now.” A rush of adrenaline fueled him. _“I’m in charge now, Phasma!”_

Han was the one to interrupt this. They had to hurry. “Finn’s been giving us a tour of this facility. Nice place you got here. But we still haven’t seen the planetary shield control room. Care to escort us?” he hinted.

She was silent for a moment. Finn knew she was thinking about something.

“No funny busi—”

Before he could finish, Phasma had grabbed Han’s blaster and his arm, and pulled him into an arm lock. She pointed the blaster he was still holding against his head.

“We’re not going anywhere,” she said. She knew that as long as she had Han hostage, they were at a standstill.

Finn started to panic. If they didn’t move, stormtroopers would be coming down these corridors for patrol any minute now. Phamsa would just have to make a sound and they would surround the three intruders. That would be the end of it.

But as it was, Finn was out of ideas. He wished he was like Rey and just be able to push people away with his mind.

_Why not?_ the voice asked him. _Just try._

Slowly, he removed his hand from the trigger of the blaster and placed it down next to his side. He could bet Phasma was smirking under her helmet. While she wasn’t making any reaction to his hand, he made a quick pushing motion in her direction, like he saw Rey do back on Takodana.

Phasma’s left leg slid backwards, forcing her down to the ground. Han wrestled himself out of her grip as she fell and turned the blaster back on her.

“Another one?” he made a quick glance at Finn. “Whatever.” He spoke to Phasma. “Get up. You’re our tour guide, remember?”

Avoiding a few technicians and passing patrols, they managed to make it to the room they needed. Only one stromtrooper was posted guard here.

Finn nodded to Chewbacca before he jumped out into the open. He waved and smiled at the guard. “Hello! When you getting off shift?”

“In another— Wait a minute…” The stormtrooper looked Finn up and down. “Why aren’t you in uniform? Are you supposed to be here?” He raised his rifle. 

Next to him, a Wookiee’s paw came down hard on the stormtrooper’s head, knocking him out cold. Han led Phasma out and into the room.

The shield control room wasn’t a large room, and no one was inside. Finn knew that unless there was something wrong with the tech, the room could function just fine on its own. If the instrumentation detected a fault, it would notify Command Control, who would begin the troubleshooting process. That would buy them time to escape from the room once they shut it down.

Han pushed Phasma into the nearest chair. She hesitated to touch any of the buttons until Finn pressed his blaster directly to her helmet. 

“Do it,” he ordered.

She nodded as she worked on the system. The screens of the consoles flashed yellow.

SHIELDS DISABLE INITIATED

Finn felt some relief. He couldn’t believe this was working. As soon as the shields were down, the Resistance, waiting outside of Starkiller’s atmosphere, would swoop in.

“Solo,” he said, ignoring Han’s scowl, “if this works, we won’t have a lot of time to find Rey.”

“Don’t worry, kid. We won’t leave without her.”

Sitting back, Phasma remained calm. “I can’t do this last part on my own. It requires two security codes to fully shut it down.”

This time, Han was the one to press his blaster to her helmet. “I know a lie when I hear it,” he said. “How well can you hear with just one ear?”

Phasma got straight to work.

SHIELDS DISABLED

“You can’t be so stupid to think this will be easy,” she warned. “My troops will storm this block and kill you all.”

“I disagree,” Finn stopped her. “I was told it was impossible to leave the First Order, yet here I am.” He looked at Han. “What do we do with her?”

Han thought for a moment before he broke into a devious smile. “Is there a garbage chute around here? Trash compactor?”

Finn nodded, his grin matching Han’s. “Yeah, there is.”

* * *

They began their search through the base. With the shields down, the First Order was on high alert and had taken precautionary measures. Blast doors had been dropped, making it harder to find passage through certain corridors. Any moment now, Finn was sure he would hear the first signs of an airstrike by the Resistance. 

With a blast door in their way, the three had to rethink their route. Chewbacca dug through his duffle, pulling out small explosion devices and attached it to the door.

Finn smiled. “If we can get through that door, the holding cells for prisoners are down that corridor. It’s heavily guarded but maybe one of us can act as a distraction while the other two search for Rey.” He paused as a terrible thought struck him. “I hope she’s still alive.” 

Han stared making an odd face that Finn couldn’t read. He bobbed his head up and down, his nose directed towards something behind Finn’s shoulder. 

“What this?” Finn mirrored the gesture. “Solo, what are you –?”

Sighing, Han put both hands on Finn’s shoulders and spun him around. 

There Rey was, climbing up an interior shaft wall on the opposite side of them. Finn gasped, relieved but not quite believing what he was seeing. Chewbacca moaned and put the explosive back in his bag, his own relief apparent.

She had escaped. Somehow, Rey had defied the odds and escaped a First Order cell.

They ran to meet her on the other side of the corridor. She struggled slightly, the weight of her stolen rifle slung around her shoulder making it a little more difficult to climb. Pulling herself up the ledge, she gasped and reached for it when she heard footsteps and immediately lowered it when she saw who it was. 

Amazed, she looked over the three standing in front of her before her eyes locked with Finn’s. Then, she broke into a run and sprinted right into his arms.

“Are you all right?” he asked as they broke apart. He found he kept touching her back, her side, to remind himself she really was there. “Did he hurt you?” 

“I don’t know where to begin,” she said. “What are you doing here?”

“We came back for you,” he said, honestly. She was why he was here, anyway.

Rey looked like she was at loss for words. Behind them, Chewbacca added his own words, and Finn noticed tears were collecting along the creases of her eyelids.

“What did he say?”

“That it was your idea.” She flung her arms around him again. Taken aback at first, Finn settled into the hug and wrapped his arms around her in return. He couldn’t help the smile on his face. She had escaped and she was safe.

Han tapped him on the shoulder, breaking the pair up. “Escape now,” he reminded them. “Hug later.”

Looking like she wanted to say something to him, Rey gaped like she did before. Words seemed to evade her.

“What is it?” Finn asked.

She shook her head. “Later,” she replied. “He’s right. Escape now.”


	11. Chapter 11

_Han was dead._

Rey still couldn’t believe it. One moment, he was standing right next to them, making plans to blow up parts of the base to help the Resistance along, the next, she was watching him fall into the chasm deep below Starkiller Base. 

And it was all at the fault of his son, who now called himself Kylo Ren.

She hated him, she thought as she buried her face in Finn’s shoulder. Both of them were shaking from what they’d just witnessed. She hated Kylo Ren, more monster than man.

 _Careful, Rey,_ the voice of her imaginary father warned. _Hate is the wrong path to take here._

But she didn’t know how else to feel as Kylo Ren turned away from where his father vanished and looked up above to spot where Finn and Rey perched. Nothing but hate and fear. 

He walked forward, towards them. She knew they couldn’t stay there. This time, Ren _would_ kill them.

Behind him, the stormtroopers in the open room advanced upon the pair. Pain fueling her, Rey returned their fire with her stolen rifle. She might have remained in her spot, if Finn hadn’t half-dragged her away. Like on the _Ervana,_ Rey allowed him to lead her.

“C’mon.” He took them outside the base, heading towards the forest. _“Falcon’s…_ somewhere around here.” It was night outside, and it looked like Finn wasn’t sure which way to go. He slowed, which was just as well. Rey was out of breath and shaking from the cold. 

They heard the snapping of foliage and jumped as they turned around to see a figure approach them.

“Stop,” Kylo Ren demanded. He coughed once and thumped a fist against his side. Blood splattered down on the snow. Apparently, Chewbacca had gotten a hit in when he shot out the moment he saw Han fall.

They stared at one another until Ren reached for his lightsaber. Quickly, Rey drew her blaster and aimed.

Ren held his hand in front of him, gazing fiercely at her as she felt herself be lifted into the air. She felt like a rag doll as her limbs lay limply at her sides.

Inhaling deeply, he flicked his hand away and Rey went flying through the air. She screamed as she saw herself approaching a nearby tree. Suddenly, she could move her arms again, her limbs frozen earlier by fear rather than Ren’s own effort.

“REY!”

Pushing her arms out in front of her, Rey focused and aimed a blast at the tree, hoping a slow pulse of unseen power would send her back to the ground and more gently. 

The ground was coming at her too fast for her comfort though. She braced herself for the impact, trying to roll into a ball to protect her face.

Freezing snow met her, making her fall just a little less painful. She landed on her side, groaning as she rolled out. Nothing felt broken, luckily, but certainly bruised. Rey was lucky this time.

The hum of an activating lightsaber reached her ears. Turning, she saw Finn holding a beam of blue light, facing the red lightsaber of Ren, which crackled unstable. Ren paused, staring at the lightsaber before he made a reaction.

“That lightsaber—It belongs to me.”

“Come get it, then,” Finn snarled.

Rey wasn’t sure who moved first, their approach seemed simultaneous. She watched as Ren struck and Finn parried and wondered where Finn learned to fight. Did the First Order teach lightsaber combat? That didn’t seem right to her.

Blocking Ren again, Finn got in a strike to Ren’s side and the man hissed in pain. Rey knew Ren was weakened by the blaster bolt in his side. If he weren’t they might both already be dead. Still, the pain of the lightsaber slash seemed to fuel him, almost as if he were growing stronger. The more Finn tried to get another strike in, the more Ren countered. He was enjoying the challenge.

Scrambling to her feet, Rey kicked away snow and ran to help Finn. She made a gesture with her hands and watched Ren lurch forward, the tip of Finn’s lightsaber slashing against his arm. The black fabric of his sleeves tore away, revealing a charred red cut along his bicep.

Ren stepped back and glared at Rey. He swung his lightsaber around in a circle, remind her of a predator that had once been playing with his prey and decided to end it there.

He pushed Rey back in return, forcing her to the ground and turned on Finn. Advancing with threatening strides, he landed a blow on Finn and cut him across the chest. Screaming, Finn fell to his knees while the lightsaber flew out of his hands, landing into the snow a distance away from them.

Extending his hand, Ren watched the lightsaber hilt twitch in the snow. He tried to call it to him, claiming what he believed should be his.

Rey couldn’t allow that to happen. Quickly, she threw her arm outward and tried to copy his movements. Clearing her mind, she imagined the hilt flying towards her.

A cold, solid metal slipped into her hands. Opening her eyes, Rey almost couldn’t believe she had done it.

Both Ren and Finn watched her, equally amazed.

“It _is_ you,” Ren murmured. Rey paid him no mind.

Rage consumed her. Igniting the lightsaber, she charged the moment blue light reflected off her face.

Blocking her strike, Ren held his lightsaber firmly in front of him. She hissed at him.

“Rey—” she heard Finn shout to her, teeth clenched.

“Find the _Falcon!”_ she shouted to him. Fury fueled her. She drew the lightsaber away and struck again. Ren countered each strike and though he was bigger than her, her ferocity and quick footedness made him struggle against her.

A rumbling, coming deep from within the ground beneath their feet, took her aback for a moment. She thought to herself, without losing focus on Ren, that the Resistance must have done what they had set out to do. The world was beginning to implode. She had to rid herself of Ren quickly and get back to the _Falcon,_ or they both would perish.

Ren seemed to understand this too. He caught back his footing and raised his lightsaber to strike. “You need a teacher!” he shouted. “I can help you! I can show you the ways of the Force!”

Slowly, Rey shook her head. “The Force?” She recalled what Maz Kanata said about the Force earlier, how if she allowed it to flow through her, it would guide her.

Hesitating, she could feel Ren’s tension as she felt a new strength lead her forward. She hissed again, striking at him over and over, barely giving him time to counter. She kept pushing him backward until he tripped over a large branch in the way and fell.

He stood up the moment he landed, but he wasn’t quick enough to deflect Rey’s strike. The impact sent his own weapon flying into the snow and he tried to keep her away by raising his hand and pushing back with the Force. 

Her rage allowed her to brush off his defensive act. Kicking him, he fell back into the snow and didn’t have time to register her next strike until she slashed him across the face and brought her lightsaber down upon his chest in an upward slash.

Circling him, Rey panted as she decided what to do with him. Ren was still breathing.

 _Kill him,_ a strange voice demanded. She had never heard it before, at least, she didn’t think so. It was angry, raw, vengeful. This was not the voice of her imaginary father, not something she ever dared imagine even in her nightmares.

She held the lightsaber over Ren, thinking.

 _End it!_ The voice chanted. _Kill him!_

The world shook beneath her feet again. Another voice, one far more familiar, drowned out the other.

 _This isn’t you, Rey,_ the voice of her imagined father urged. _This is the dark side. Don’t listen to it._

She hesitated but the other voice came back.

_End him. He tried to kill you. Kill your friend. He deserves it._

The voices were at war with each other.

_This isn’t you, Rey. You’re a good person. Don’t do this._

_Do it!_

Rey wanted to scream. She held the lightsaber upward, blade pointing at Kylo’s chest.

_You need to find Finn! The planet is falling apart!_

Suddenly, she felt herself recoil from both voices. Finn was still out there, looking for the _Millennium Falcon,_ and if he had already found it, he was probably looking for her. He was too loyal a friend to leave without her and the longer she lingered over the unconscious body of Kylo Ren, the more she put a true friend in danger.

She ran back towards—at least, she thought she was going the right way—where she last saw Finn. The blood droplets in the snow helped her retrace her steps, but eventually, she lost sight of them.

“Finn!” she called out. “Finn!”

There was no answer. Rey thought she could never feel more alone than she had been on Jakku. She was wrong.

Perhaps, she really would die here. She closed her eyes. It would be her own fault, really, she wasn’t quick enough and she had allowed her emotions to distract her.

A glow enveloped her. At first, she thought if she opened her eyes, she would see the world’s core just as it was about to engulf her. Then, she realized the glow was too localized.

What she was seeing were the beams of a ship. 

The _Falcon_ made a graceful and slow touch down in front of her, the ramp quickly unfolding. Through open doors, warm light was visible from inside and the shadow of a familiar face appeared.

“Rey!” Finn shouted. “C’mon!”

She didn’t hesitate to run to him.


	12. Chapter 12

D’Qar was a nice change of scenery for now. Far away and safe from Kylo Ren, Finn and Rey had time to breathe for a little while. The base was in the middle of evacuation, Finn explained, as he tore off his shirt and tended to his cauterized wound in the Falcon on the way. It was no longer a usable base now that the First Order knew where it was.

Upon landing, a small team was waiting for them. The only face Finn knew was Poe Dameron, just back from leading the strike on Starkiller. He pointed him out to Rey but neither had spoken to him as the medical team looked them over and brought them into the medbay.

The two sat side by side on a hospital bed, waiting for permission to be released. When the kind doctor, Kalonia returned, she was not alone. An aging woman, petite, but graceful and commanding at the same time.

Finn stood up when they walked in, but they quickly told him to sit down.

“That’s Leia Organa,” he mumbled to Rey. She felt her eyes widened.

Kalonia chuckled. “Rey, you’re free to go. Finn,” she turned her attention. “I’m going to put a bacta patch on your shoulder. Only will take a minute.”

“I would like to speak with you, Rey,” Leia asked. 

Uncertain, Rey glanced at Finn, who nodded to her. “I’ll find you in a bit,” he promised. 

General Organa took her next door to an interior room full of consoles and droids at work. It was almost empty; Rey only spotted three people working inside. Everyone else was running around, working on the evacuation effort.

“Have a seat, Rey,” Leia offered. There weren’t any proper seats where they were at, but many crates and boxes that would do just fine. “I’ve been wanting to speak with you.”

She nodded and waited. Since she got on the _Falcon,_ Rey hadn’t spoken much. Exhausted, she tried to doze but she was too wired. Too much had happened on Starkiller.

“To start, I want you to tell me what happened with Han and Ben.”

Rey felt herself cross her arms and grip her hands against her shoulders. Suddenly, she felt chilled. “I thought…?”

“I know what happened,” Leia acknowledged, gently but firmly. “I _felt it._ But I want to hear it from you.”

Her hands dropped, and she found herself staring at her knees. Heart clenching, she didn’t want to repeat what she saw.

Leia was patient. “It’s okay, Rey.”

Taking a deep breath, she tried. “He walked out… There was nothing to hold on to, but he walked out. I don’t know what he was thinking, but he… He faced Kylo Ren alone.”

“He tried to speak to our son,” Leia reminded her.

“I… didn’t hear everything they said,” Rey continued. “But when he… Han didn’t fight him. Didn’t call out. He just… Han reached out and put his hand on Ren’s face. And then he fell.”

Remaining quiet for a moment after she finished, Leia looked like she was trying to stay composed. Then, she looked up at Rey, tears shining in her eyes.

“Do you know your family name, Rey?”

It had been on her mind since she touched the lightsaber in Maz’s castle. If anyone could tell her she was right, it was Leia Organa. Rey swallowed, her throat suddenly feeling dry.

“I was very young when I was left on Jakku,” she confessed. “But I think… _maybe…_ your brother adopted me. If he gave me his name, it would be… _Skywalker.”_

To her surprise, Leia’s face was the one of someone who had just seen a ghost. She covered her mouth with her hand as if to try to keep her composure, before she gave up and enveloped Rey in a hug.

“We looked for you.” The older woman was sobbing. “For years, we searched. The First Order was taking our children… We thought they took you too.”

“I was never with the Order,” answered Rey, but now she was totally confused. “Wait, you _looked_ for me? Didn’t Luke leave me there?”

Leia pulled back, eyes wide and almost in disbelief. “Rey… You were taken from him. Someone _stole_ you.”

“I—I don’t remember.” Now she was crying. “I thought I had been abandoned.”

“Never!” Leia gasped. “He loved you! Losing you destroyed him.”

Wiping her face with her arm wraps, Rey stood up. “Then, I need to find him. Where’s BB-8? He’s got part of the map—”

“It’s complete.” Leia was beaming. “Thanks to you and Finn, the map’s complete.”

“I’ll take the _Falcon,”_ Rey insisted. “It needs work, but it flies just fine.” 

The two women walked out of the room, into a hangar full of X-wings getting final repairs for the evacuation. Urgency suddenly overtook Rey’s thoughts. The Resistance needed help; they needed the last Jedi.

And yet, even if Luke returned, there was one person who wasn’t. Now that she knew the truth, Rey suddenly wished she had gotten more time with Han.

“He shouldn’t have faced him,” Rey said heavily. “He should have run.”

Overseeing the repairs, Leia didn’t look at her when she replied, “Han always… well, his first instinct when things got hard was to run. And even when he did, he was never far. He always came back.”

They stopped in front of a blue A-wing. “How do you lead all this when everything seems so hopeless?” asked Rey.

“Sometimes, I want to run too,” Leia admitted. “But I let that spur me on to the next moment. I know I’m not alone.” She turned and placed a gentle hand on Rey’s shoulder, looking her in the eyes. “Neither are you.” Then, she started looking at the state of her clothes, worn and dirty from scavenging in a sandy desert. “I’ll find you some clothes to change into. You’re going to have to leave as soon as possible. We can’t stay here.”

“Finn?” she asked.

“Can go wherever he wants. If he wants to go with us or be dropped off, he can board one of our ships.”

“Sorry to interrupt, ma’am,” a voice came from behind them. “But I’d much rather go with Rey, if she’ll let me.”

They turned around to see Finn coming towards him. He was wearing a new, cleaner shirt that looked like the ones a lot of Resistance members were wearing. It was beige with long sleeves. The flight jacket was slung over his arm. 

A smile twitched in the corners of her mouth. “Of course, I do,” she told him.

“Then,” Leia announced, “I’ll get some packs of clothes and toiletries for both of you.” Like she was making a mental checklist from herself, she took a moment to think. “Maybe do a quick rundown of what’s in the _Falcon,”_ she suggested. “Food, blaster bolts, medical supplies…”

“Will do,” Finn said. 

Leia nodded and left them to find what they needed. Alone, they turned to one another.

“I hope you don’t mind me going,” he said, bashfully. “I’d rather be with you.”

Reaching to take his hand, Rey squeezed it. “I want you with me.”

The smile he gave her was almost as bright as the sun overhead.

* * *

Cleaned up after a lengthy period of inactivity, the droid R2-D2 led the way up the Falcon’s ramp. When Leia introduced him to Finn and Rey, she carefully explained that Rey was the same one that Luke had taken in and who vanished later. The droid remembered a little girl by that name, and he rolled around her slowly in excitement at their reunion.

“I’m sorry, R2,” she said, “but I don’t remember much about my life before Jakku.”

The droid didn’t seem to mind, he was much more interested in finding Luke anyway.

Bashfully, Rey looked to Finn as Leia fiddled with the seals on the vest she found for Rey. She had told him, quickly and without many details, that she had once been the adopted daughter of Luke and that her memory of abandonment was incorrect. She could tell Finn had many questions, but he didn’t ask. Rey wasn’t sure she could answer any of them anyway.

“Well, I guess the patches are as straight as I can get them,” Leia finally declared. “These are just Velcro. Next time we meet, I can get you both proper ones.”

“I’m not sure we’re worthy of being given positions yet,” Finn pointed out. His own jacket had pins fastened through the fabric. There was a hole in the shoulder of it, made by Ren’s lightsaber. She found him another jacket to wear, but Finn told her he wanted to hold on to this one. 

“Honorary members,” she corrected him. “If you decide you want to stay, we can get you something more formal.” Winking, she grinned at him. “I really hope you decide to stay.”

Finn laughed and followed R2 up the ramp, leaving Rey and Leia alone again. 

“I’m proud of what you’re about to do,” Leia told her.

“But you’re afraid,” Rey guessed, her voice was serious. “In sending me away, you’re reminded…”

“You won’t share the fate of my son.”

There was one more thing Rey still hadn’t told Leia. “Back on Starkiller, when I fought him, I heard a voice. It wanted me to kill him.”

Looking like she knew what Rey was talking about, Leia held her hand up and placed it on her niece’s cheek. “But you didn’t.” She smiled. “You’re not like him.” 

Nodding, Rey hugged her one more time before heading to the ramp.

“Rey,” Leia called out. She turned again to see her aunt smile reassuringly. “May the Force be with you.”

Inside the _Falcon,_ Finn was helping Chewbacca with final flight-prep. She tried to take the co-pilot’s seat but was stopped by a big, furry arm.

“Chewie, the _Falcon_ flies better with two people at the controls!” she groaned. “You know that!”

He moaned, _[“That’s my seat,”]_ before he turned and sat down in the co-pilot’s chair.

“You mean it?” she almost cried.

He nodded and groaned again, gesturing to the pilot’s chair.

Finn took a seat behind her. “If you need a gunner, give me a shout,” he laughed.

She grinned. “Hopefully, this journey will be quiet.” Remembering something, she dug through her bag and held out the lightsaber to him. “It was my father’s, and his father’s, but you should have it. You’re better at using it than me.”

Shaking his head, he refused and pushed it back towards her. “If it was Luke’s, maybe we should give it back to him.”

That seemed like an excellent idea. Hiding it back in her bag, she rotated her seat back to face the front viewport, staring at the controls. Chewbacca reached his arm over and mussed her hair playfully. She couldn’t hide her grin.

Behind her, R2-D2 beeped happily as he watched her play over the controls and the _Millennium Falcon_ rose.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All right. Last chapter for now. I'm about halfway through with the TLJ portion at the moment of writing this and I know before I publish it, I'll have to do some edits for consistency. 
> 
> It might be a while before this fic sees it's first update for part 2, so I recommend that people bookmark this fic to be notified when the next update comes up!


	13. Prelude

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, I'm back! I haven't given up on this rewrite!
> 
> Because you all have been waiting so patiently, I'm going to give you a little "prelude" chapter. I'm actually done with the next section of the story, but I'm working on some edits and I'm thinking I will need to add some additional chapters. I imagine I might be able to start posting new chapters in September, as long as I keep to my writing schedule.

If it weren’t for his knowledge of what befell here, Luke would have found nothing out of the ordinary about Cloud City at first glance. It was still as beautiful as the last time he had visited only a month prior. 

Had it really only been a month?

Nothing might have been out of the ordinary to his sight, but in the Force, something was definitely different. Focusing on his other source of sight, he grimaced when he saw the hidden side of Cloud City.

Pain. Heartbreaking pain. It filled his senses when he focused, threatening to drown the Jedi Master. A memory of a time long ago, when he had just left his home on Tatooine, resurfaced. 

_“I felt a great disturbance in the Force... as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror, and were suddenly silenced. I fear something terrible has happened.”_

Luke wondered if he was feeling something similar to what old Obi Wan had when the remains of Alderaan drifted by the _Millennium Falcon._ The tragedy of Cloud City screamed through the Force, but never faded into silence. No one would forget what befell here. The Force would make sure of it.

Landing on an empty tarmac, he took a few minutes to get his bearings together. Only a month ago, he came here to introduce Lando and his family to Rey. Now he was back, and Rey wasn’t the only one who wasn’t here.

He composed himself before he went to lower the ramp of his transport. Somberly, he waited until he could exit, taking in the orange-pink skyline and thinking about the first time he came here, years ago, when he had another hand and a different lightsaber.

Lando was waiting for him outside.

“You didn’t have to come all the way down to greet me,” said Luke as the two of them embraced. “I know the way.”

As they parted, he took in Lando’s appearance. He looked like he aged ten years in just a few days. What struck Luke the most was that his normally fashionable friend was just wearing a simple shirt and black trousers today. Then he looked closer at Lando’s face and saw deep lines and dark circles under his eyes. He looked like he hadn’t slept in days. He probably hadn’t.

“I wanted to get out for a bit,” Lando confessed. “It’s hard being at home right now.”

Sighing, Luke replied, “I understand, and I’m so sorry, Lando.”

“We still don’t know how they got past detection.” He said this like he was trying to apologize for failure. “They knew what we had and how to get around it.”

“It’s not your fault,” Luke reminded him. “And we’re going to find them, even if we have to go to the edge of the galaxy.”

“Tendra’s already gone to search,” Lando explained, referring to his spouse, the wealthy Sacorrian businesswoman. “Said she’d contact everyone she knows with connections to shady dealings, hoping she’d get a lead before their trail went cold.”

The two began their walk away from the platform, towards the living sector of Cloud City. It was eerily quiet, making Luke uneasy. 

“Lando,” he began, carefully. “Did they take all of them?”

“Every child who couldn’t hide. All gone.” Lando stopped to stare out at the horizon, haunted and exhausted. “Maree was just starting to use furniture to help her balance on her feet.”

They were quiet the rest of the walk to Lando’s home and when they opened the door, the only sound to greet them was the voice of a cleaning droid. No kids. No Tendra. 

The pristine white interior of the home used to be a cheerful place, now it didn’t feel like a home at all.

Lando made them drinks as Luke got comfortable on the couch. He looked over to the side table where a hologram rotated through flickering pics of the family. There was even one taken recently, one of Lando’s little boy sitting next to Luke on this very couch, watching tiny Rey with curiosity and the intensity only a child could have. 

Three nights ago, 43 children were stolen from Bespin by people dressed in stormtrooper armor. Forty-three, and that wasn’t enough for the New Republic to care. He would have thought the grief of war hero Lando Calrissian would have rallied the cries for justice, but even that didn’t break through the apathy the galaxy suddenly adapted.

Setting their drinks down, Lando joined them, so somber that Luke hardly recognized his old friend.

“You think it was the Empire… what’s left of it?” It had been on Luke’s mind since he got the news. It was widely known that after the Battle of Jakku, a handful of survivors had fled together, likely to find solace in the Unknown Regions. A few in the Rebellion wanted to give chase, but it was agreed that the effort probably wouldn’t be worth it. The war was won and finally the galaxy was free to set a fresh course where one man didn’t hold terror above their heads.

That was, until a group of stormtroopers appeared on Bespin and ripped children out of the arms of their families.

“I didn’t want to believe it myself,” Lando confessed, “but the proof is right in front of us.” 

He stood up and went into another room, returning with the skull-like helmet of an Imperial soldier. 

“I shot this one myself while giving chase. By the time I saw the Star Destroyer, it was flying away, my kids with it.”

That settled it, then, though there had never been a doubt in Luke’s mind that he would track down the missing children and Imperial kidnappers soon. He had the ship prepped and ready for a journey, enough food and supplies for two men, one a father desperate to find his family.

“When do you want to leave?” he asked.

“Now, if you have the fuel.”


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And here is the start to the not-so-Last Jedi section!

The _Millennium Falcon_ soared over ocean, dotted by a series of small, rocky islands capped by green moss. Ahch-To was mainly uninhabitable, with the only source of food coming from the sea and local wildlife. Very little grew on the barren islands.

They approached one of the bigger islands, as marked on the star map. The ship slowed as they searched for a spot to land, eventually hovering over the widest, flattest space they could find on the base of the island.

For an hour, the _Falcon_ sat there as Finn, Rey Skywalker, Chewbacca, and R2-D2 made a plan. The island wasn’t huge, but it would still take time to search for Luke. There was a possibility he wasn’t on this island at all. They noted a stone staircase, overgrown with sea grass and moss, starting at the base of a nearby cliff and thought that was the best path to begin at. The _Falcon_ still needed some repairs, as Unkar Plutt did a lot of damage to the ship’s inner workings and the Resistance didn’t have time to take care of everything.

So, it was decided: Chewbacca would stay behind to do repairs, R2 would stay behind because he couldn’t make the climb, and Finn and Rey would begin the search.

Finn hit the button to lower the ramp and everyone emerged to take their first look around. Except for the cries of sea birds overhead and the gentle crashes of waves against the rocks, the island was peaceful. The air was cool, was not so much that the two humans would be uncomfortable outside in what they were wearing. 

They waved as they began their journey up the incline.

The stones were old and worn, grouped by the thousands. Along with the steep incline, the pair needed to stop to rest frequently.

Eventually, after what seemed like an hour of hiking, they made it to the top of the steps. They were met with a clearing, decorated with small stone structures that almost remind them of graves. 

Almost as still as the stones, a lone figure, cloaked in beige, stood overlooking the sea. They knew who he was the moment they saw him. There was only one person he could be. 

And yet, no one spoke. They just waited.

Finally, the figure turned and pulled back his hood. His left hand was flesh, but the right was mechanical and skeletal. 

The tired and weathered face of Luke Skywalker stared back at them.

Silence hung in the air. No one dared to speak a word. 

Luke stared the pair up and down. With Finn, he furrowed his brow like he was sizing him up, but with Rey, he almost seemed like he was seeing a ghost. His eyes widened in disbelief.

Finn nudged her side, urging her forward.

She suddenly remembered the lightsaber in her bag and reached in to dig it out. Stepping forward, she held it out as an offering, a plea. 

Tearing his eyes away from her face, Luke looked down at the lightsaber, his mouth dropping. He brought his hand to his face and glanced back at her, tears shining in his eyes.

Reduced to sobbing, the legendary Luke Skywalker fell to his knees. The lightsaber went forgotten as he beheld his daughter for the first time in fourteen years.

* * *

“—And then we got back to the Resistance and Leia sent us to find you,” Rey concluded her story as the three hiked back down the stairs. Going down was certainly easier than going up. 

Luke had remained silent the entire time she and Finn told him of their adventures. At times, he looked bewildered by what he was hearing. 

They stopped in front of a particular hut, the doorway fitted with a slab of sheet metal. This must have been where Luke had made his home. 

“The Resistance needs our help,” Finn repeated. “You need to come back.”

“Not sure what an old man has to offer,” Luke countered. “I was hardly any help back when we first learned about the First Order.”

“When was that?” asked Finn.

“A long time ago,” he stared out to the sea like he was remembering a bad time in his life. “A friend of mine lost his children to the First Order. We searched for years and never found them.”

It was afternoon by now, the sun casting low shadows over the island. The _Falcon’s_ roof was just coming into view.

“They’ve taken a lot from you,” Finn pointed out. “All your children. They even got—”

“Ben chose to go to them,” Luke corrected. “He was a grown man when he made that choice. We thought—Leia and I—we suspected someone was watching him. The children of those who served the Rebellion were going missing. We thought training him to be a Jedi would protect him.”

He sighed as he gazed back at the _Falcon,_ tears shining in his eyes. They stopped walking for a moment. 

“Was it quick?” he asked. “Han?”

Rey nodded. “It was.” Well, she didn’t know, but she hoped it was. Perhaps it would give Luke a peace of mind.

“Chewbacca’s here?”

“R2 also,” Finn answered.

Luke took another deep breath before he continued down the staircase again. Holding back, Rey and Finn looked to each other and waited.

“He didn’t look happy to see me,” Rey said. She felt her lower lip quiver. What if Luke really hadn’t wanted her?

Noticing her anxiety, Finn wrapped his arm around her waist and stood closer to her. “I think he’s just overwhelmed. We… told him a lot.”

They watched as the Jedi Master entered the landing area of the _Falcon,_ arms held out as Chewbacca walked over to him and the old friends embraced. From this distance, neither of them could hear what was going on, but they could guess. Reluctant to interrupt them, Finn and Rey stayed on the slope for a few more minutes.

“Kylo Ren went to the First Order on his own?” Rey said, repeating what Luke had told them.

“It must be true,” Finn answered. “I never saw them take new recruits over a certain age. They liked them young. Easier to train and mold to First Order standards.”

Still, Rey wasn’t sure she could wrap her head around the concept. “Why would anyone want to willingly join them?” she asked, but she knew that answer already. Sometimes, she witnessed stormtrooper patrols on Jakku bothering the younger scavengers. A few went with them. She understood how appealing the promise of a full belly could be. Most of the time, the stormtroopers just brought trouble, which was why Rey did her best to stay away from them. If they spotted her using her powers, that might have been bad for her. “Why would someone with a family— _love_ —want to join them?”

Shrugging, Finn didn’t have an answer for her.

“We should go,” he urged. She knew he was right. They couldn’t hover any longer.

When they got to the _Falcon’s_ ramp, they found Luke and Chewbacca already inside, heads tilted down as they sat around the dejarik table and whispered to each other. Rey had to listen very closely to hear what they were saying.

“So, you got a hit on him?” Luke asked.

Chewbacca moaned and nodded.

“Glad you did. He deserved it.”

Sliding away from the booth, Luke patted the Wookiee on the arm and turned to Finn and Rey. He stared at her again, in particular.

“I think you and I have a lot to talk about,” he said, raising his arm slightly like he was asking her to go outside with him.

She closed her eyes and breathed. “I guess we do.”

Finn did not follow them out. Part of her was grateful for that, but she also was uncomfortable being alone with her adopted father. She didn’t know Luke and for years, she held anger towards the parents she believed had left her on Jakku. Even if he hadn’t been the one to leave her there, he didn’t swoop in to save her, the way she imagined a Jedi Master and a father would.

They stopped outside the ramp again, R2 following behind them. Rey found a tool crate on the ground and flipped it, so she had somewhere to sit. This might take a while.

Luke, however, just slumped down on the ramp. “Jakku, huh?”

“Yeah,” she grunted. “That’s where I was all this time.”

Almost like a child, Luke trailed his shoe through the dirt, lost in thought. “I looked for you,” he said. “All the worlds I had leads on, I went there and looked for you. Jakku had never come up.”

“Not surprising,” she agreed. “No one really wants to go to Jakku.”

“I should have, though.” There was that haunted dullness in his eye. “I should have looked _everywhere.”_

That was what still bothered her: he hadn’t searched everywhere. “I bet you were busy,” she half-spat, “being a Jedi and all.”

His eyes widened. Dropping from the side of the ramp, he got onto his feet. “You think I didn’t care,” he realized. “Rey, I _love you._ You’re my daughter.”

_“Adopted_ daughter,” she reminded him.

“That never mattered,” he shot back, but then he looked puzzled. “How much do you know?”

Digging into her bag again, she retrieved the lightsaber and held it out to him. This time, he took it and held it gingerly with the pads of his fingers. “When I touched that,” she explained, “I saw… something. I saw a man and a woman hand me off to you. I saw them killed. Then Leia told me I was _kidnapped_ and that’s how I ended up on Jakku. That’s all I know.”

He nodded. “That’s about the gist of it. Your parents brought you to me when you were only a few months old. You showed signs of Force-sensitivity already, and the First Order had an interest in you. They thought you’d be safer with a Jedi Master… We were wrong.”

Standing up, he got closer to her. “For four and a half years, I raised you. We were a small family, but those were the happiest years of my life. I had just started training children. Everything seemed to be going well. Then one night I returned from being away for a week to help a friend search for his own missing kids, only to find you were snatched away.”

“So then, your friend’s children weren’t the only ones taken,” Rey observed.

“Lando and I thought if we could find at least one of you, we could find all of you. We focused on you for a while, since your trail was fresh.” He shook his head. “Like Lando’s kids, you just… vanished. All our leads were dead ends.” Then he furrowed his brows. “But you didn’t end up in the First Order. You were on Jakku.”

Rey tried to think about the day she found herself alone in the desert. She still remembered how fear seized her those first few days, how she cried for hours until she was exhausted and thirsty. She learned quickly tears were a waste of hydration.

“I don’t think I remember the day right,” she explained. “I recalled my parents being the ones that left me there. But that’s impossible; they were dead. And if you didn’t leave me there, that means whoever took me left me.”

“And that puzzles me,” Luke whispered. “If it wasn’t the First Order who took you, who did?”

She couldn’t understand why someone would want to steal the daughter of Luke Skywalker just to leave her on some backwater planet. Surely, she would have been worth something for ransom or a target of a bounty. 

_Rey, be brave._

That voice wasn’t her father’s—biological or adopted—yet somehow, it kept appearing in her life, giving her advice and encouraging her when she needed it the most. It had been the voice that brought her back to her senses on Starkiller, when she was willing to die just to get her revenge. It had been that voice that reminded her what was important; reminded her that Finn was waiting for her.

“Luke,” she began and glimpsed disappointment in his eyes. It still felt too familiar to call him _father._ “The Resistance needs our help. The First Order is _massive_ and I’ve seen what they can do. We need to go back to them.”

“Did they give you coordinates for their new base?”

“Not yet,” she admitted. “Leia said she’d send them to us when they got there.”

He looked hopeless when she waited for his answer. “I’m not sure how much good one out-of-practice Jedi will be,” he said, “but I’ll try to help.” A smile widened on his face, though Rey could tell it was forced. “And until then, we can get to know each other again. Your friend too. He seems like a nice guy.”

Standing up, Rey walked over to Luke and wrapped her arms around him. “Thank you,” she whispered. 

Luke made no movement at first, but he quickly relaxed and settled into the hug, his arms wrapping around her shoulders. “I missed you, Rey.”

* * *

That night, Luke went back to his hut up the slopes and Rey slept on the _Falcon_ where it was warm and not at the mercy of the elements. Even if Finn complained that the mattresses in the crew’s cabin were lumpy and _full of sand,_ Rey didn’t mind. There was always sand in her hammock in her AT-AT, no matter how much she shook it out.

“You stormtroopers sound spoiled,” she teased. 

Finn rolled his eyes. “The mattresses in the barracks weren’t great, but at least they didn’t have sand in them!”

Curling up in a blanket, she gazed at his new shirt, eyeing the area where Kylo’s saber struck. “How’s the shoulder?”

Shrugging, Finn said, “Stiff, but it doesn’t hurt. Bacta didn’t have to do much. The wound was already cauterized.”

Rey noticed herself frown. It had looked bad to her when she saw the wound back on Starkiller, but Finn didn’t seem interested in talking about it either. She dropped the subject.

“My father said I was kidnapped. He thought it was the First Order, but then I was left on Jakku… The First Order didn’t leave kids randomly, right?”

“They took everyone they could,” Finn reminded her. “And I mean, everyone.”

“So, it’s unlikely the kidnapper was the First Order…”

“Sounds like it.” Finn grabbed his own blanket and sat down on the bunk opposite of her. “I wish I could help you more, Rey.”

He turned the lights out and stretched out on his mattress. Rey stayed quiet for a few minutes, listening to the sound of Finn’s breathing until it evened. 

Unable to sleep, she turned on her side and tried to remember anything about Luke and her time with him. She thought, perhaps, she could recall a memory of overlooking a kitchen, a small cake in front of her and people smiling as they watched her, but she wasn’t sure if that was her imagination or not.

But even if she couldn’t remember him, she didn’t doubt the sincerity in Luke’s voice when he told her he loved her. The notion made her heart seize.

* * *

Finn woke her up the next morning, excitement in his voice.

“Rey! Wake up! You gotta see this!” 

Grumbling, she rolled over on the mattress, rubbing her eyes and glaring. “Worth leaving my warm bed?” she asked.

“Definitely.”

She winced when her bare feet touched the icy floor and quickly pulled on her boots to run after him. Wrapping the blanket around her shoulders, it shielded her from the blast of cold air she felt the moment she stepped out on the ramp. The island was shrouded in mist and she took a moment to gape at the visibly cloudy air around her.

Finn was standing at the back of the _Falcon,_ facing the edge of the island and the sea. Upon the horizon, the sky began to change pink as the sun peeked out over the ocean, its image reflecting on the water.

She had seen her fair share of sunrises on Jakku and the water made this one more unique to her eyes, but she wondered how many Finn ever got to see. His world was full of cold, soulless, and metallic corridors, late night patrols, and blasters. He probably didn’t get to take time to do what he wanted or stopped to do something as simple as watching a sunrise.

Taking a place next to him, they stared out at the sun and the sea together, listening to the cries of seabirds overhead and the crash of waves against stone and sand.

“One of my favorite times of the day,” a voice commented behind them, startling them.

Luke stood there, eyes wide and mortified. “Sorry!” he gasped. “I didn’t mean to—" Then he laced his fingers together, sheepishly. “I was trying to make lots of noise so I wouldn’t. Guess you didn’t hear me.”

“We were just admiring the sunrise,” Finn said. “We wouldn’t mind if you joined us.”

Awkwardly, Luke stood next to the younger man. They remained silent for a few more minutes, until the sun was higher a fuller.

Finally, he broke the silence again. “How familiar are you with the Force?” He wasn’t addressing anyone in particular.

Rey shrugged. “I didn’t know what it was until recently.” She winced when she noticed Luke’s disappointment. Try as she might, she really couldn’t remember him. Perhaps when she was little, he taught her a couple of things. “I can do things like jump really far and a few days ago, I learned I could do this—” Searching for an object, any object, she quickly eyed a loose stone in the ocean. Clearing her mind, she lifted her arms and called it to her, just like she had with the lightsaber.

The stone shifted and emerged from the sea, but it wasn’t the size she thought it was. In fact, it probably would be more appropriate to call the stone a boulder…

And that boulder was flying towards them at high-speed, appearing bigger and bigger by the second.

“DUCK!” Finn cried.

They all jumped out of the way, just in time for the boulder to miss them and slide into the ground, spilling the contents of toolboxes and loose cargo.

_Control still needs a lot of work,_ said the voice of her imaginary father. She wasn’t sure what to call the voice anymore. It seemed to come and go as it pleased, something she wouldn’t think her imagination could do.

Shakily, Luke stood up and brushed off his gray tunic as Finn and Rey followed. “Well, that was certainly _something,”_ he said. “I’ve never known an untrained Force-user who could do _that._ At least, not with an object that big. Control could definitely use some work,” he added as an afterthought. 

She wanted to tell him about the voice, but Rey knew hearing voices and following their direction was something a crazy person did. She saw enough scavengers, unstable from years of isolation and starvation, have full conversations with themselves and knew hearing voices was never a good thing.

Luke turned to Finn. “What about you?”

“Oh,” Finn began. “I’m not—”

“According to Rey, you used a lightsaber just fine. Against Kylo Ren, no less.”

“I was trained in combat,” Finn insisted. “Close combat weapons were part of that regime. I’m no Jedi.”

The corners of Luke’s mouth twitched. “Not now, but you might be one someday.”

He walked over to the edge of the island, just where land met the sea, and sat down. Motioning to the two to join him, Finn and Rey shrugged at one another and followed.

“I’d like to lead you in a simple meditation,” he said. “To test Force-sensitivity.”

“Doesn’t sound too bad,” replied Finn.

“Just follow my lead. Do what I do.” 

The Jedi Master sat cross-legged, his hands open and palms facing the sky as they sat on either knee. Rey and Finn copied him.

“Now, close your eyes,” he instructed. “Feel your consciousness. Imagine it’s its own being.”

Rey tried to do that, but it seemed odd to think of her mind as a body. She decided maybe to do what she had found worked in the past. She cleared her mind and waited.

“Reach out to the Force,” Luke continued.

She extended her arm and pulled back when she heard him sigh.

“No, Rey, not physically.”

Embarrassed, she tried again and wondered how Finn was faring. She guessed Luke was watching both of them and wasn’t sure if this was a test or not, but she would rather not fail.

“What exactly are we reaching out to?” Finn asked.

“The Force surrounds us, binds us together. It flows through every living creature in the galaxy.” Maz Kanata had said something similar. Rey recalled what she felt when she concentrated on Starkiller. It almost seemed natural to let her instinct guide her, even when she crossed blades with Kylo Ren. “Concentrate not on yourself or anything else. You’ll know when you feel it.”

“I felt it once,” Rey said, hoping it wasn’t rude to talk right now. “It was like… _instinct._ Once I let go of my thoughts and just _followed,_ I felt it.”

She heard Luke hum. “That’s wonderful insight. Thank you, Rey. Now, what I need both of you to do is concentrate and be silent. Be still. I’ll follow up in a few minutes.”

Not wanting to disappoint her adopted father, Rey did as he asked. She cleared her mind (which was hard to do at any time, but she knew how to kind of do it), and waited, her eyes seeing only darkness and feeling the cool air on her skin. She was glad she brought a blanket with her… Oh, wait. Oops. No thoughts.

Suddenly, her vision brightened, fading in on the island from overhead, like she was one of the sea birds. She continued to let her mind wander, finding she was not confined to her singular vision as her awareness of the island expanded in ways she never could before.

There was life all around her. Luke. Finn. Up on the cliffs, a small group of beings living in the other huts near Luke. She could see the life pulse in the sea grass, the moss, and the purple flowers that grew sparingly along the rocks. There were birds, insects, and fish all around her. 

Next to her, Finn gasped. She wondered if he could see it too.

As she smiled to herself, the island shifted. The air around her cooled as her sight shifted to what she couldn’t see. Decaying flesh and molding vegetation. In the earth, there were bones buried and forgotten. At first, she wanted to back away from death, until she perceived how the island recycled it and with it, brought new life. Here, death was only frightful to mortal minds. 

At the same time, she felt warm and cold, both trying to draw her to it. Neither seemed more wonderful nor threatening than the other.

Between all that, there was balance, but the cold tried pulling her to it, away from that balance. She saw a dark place on the island’s edge where a low cliff met the sea. It called to her…

“Is this the Force?” she asked, trying to ignore the pull. “What I’m feeling now? Life and death in harmony?”

“Warm and cold?” Finn added. She smiled again. So, he _could_ feel it after all.

Rey still hadn’t opened her eyes, but she could imagine Luke nodding. “It is everywhere. Inside all of us. You can open your eyes now.”

For a moment, she struggled to pull away. The dark place tried to suck her in, wanting to keep her mind with it. She forced her eyes to open, feeling disoriented when she pulled back to reality.

“You see,” he continued, “the Force doesn’t belong to the Jedi. It does not belong to anyone. It is a part of everyone and not something anyone can fully control. So many have gotten this wrong.”

“This was where the first Jedi temple was, right?” Finn asked. When Luke affirmed the statement, he grinned. “I could see the light where it once stood.”

For a moment, Rey wished she had too. Perhaps her face showed it because when she glanced back at her new mentor, Luke eyed her warily. It was not the warmth she imagined a father would give her. It was a look of suspicion.

However, Finn distracted them. “There was something else,” he began. “I felt a connection between the three of us.”

“That’s the Force at work.” Luke explained. “It connects us to one another.”

Finn furrowed his brows before he glanced at Rey. “Right… Maybe… It felt—Well, it was like when we first met, Rey. I thought you looked familiar. At one point, I thought you might have also been and ex-stromtrooper.” He laughed, but she could tell he was trying to hide his insecurity of the thought. “Crazy right?”

Running his fingers through his beard. Luke nodded. “Perhaps.” He stared out to the sea again, like he was lost in thought. Finn and Rey sat silent for a moment, the awkwardness of not knowing what to do setting in.

“That’s enough for today,” Luke dismissed them. “There’s a lot to take in. Think about what you’ve learned. Maybe if you’re up to it tomorrow, we can try some more.”

Standing up, Finn stared back up at the _Falcon._ “I’ll check to see if we’ve gotten any messages from the Resistance,” he said as he started walking in the direction of the ramp. “You coming, Rey? I bet we can find something in storage to eat.”

Hesitating, Rey thought about staying. She wanted to ask about the dark place she glimpsed, but the way Luke had stared at her before made her uneasy. 

Almost to help her make up her mind, her stomach growled. 

“Breakfast sounds good,” she agreed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're back!
> 
> I'm starting on writing the final portion of this rewrite now. For the next few weeks, you will be getting updates to this story on Wednesdays and Saturdays!


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promised you Poe chapters and here's the first! There's not a ton of them, but enough to cover this side of the story!

With a duffle bag in hand, Poe Dameron ran through a jungle clearing towards Black One. He weaved within a crowd of busy officers and crew members, all trying to find where they were supposed to load up. The evacuation effort was well underway.

A war was coming, but if they were lucky, they could avoid it for just a little longer.

Emerging from the bunkers where Operations had been set up, General Organa, followed by C-3PO, observed the efforts. Since she learned of Han Solo’s death, she had been moving more like she was on autopilot. Poe worried her grief was clouding her mentality. He wasn’t concerned she wouldn’t be able to direct the evacuation, but he was concerned what all this grief would add up to later on. 

Running after her, her daughter Kaydel brushed her hand against her mother’s sleeve before pointing to a transport. She urged her to go with her, only for Leia to hold her hand up, a silent request to stop. Turning around, she found Poe and strode up to him.

“There’s been a change of plans, Commander,” she told him.

He raised an eyebrow. “No evacuation?” he asked. That seemed unwise. Then he realized it probably wasn’t what had changed.

The general shut her eyes. “We’re going to Crait instead, on General Calrissian’s insistence. He hasn’t seen the First Order in their boundaries.”

“Ah.” Yes, that would be better than trying to maneuver through a potential blockade.

She smiled at him. “I know what all of you are thinking. Don’t worry, this old lady’s got some fire left in her.” Patting Poe on the shoulder, she winked at him. “We’ve got work to do, Commander.”

“Yes, General.” He gave her a quick salute before he turned back to his X-wing. BB-8 was already loaded into the droid slot, waiting for his pilot. “Ready for this, Bee?” He tossed his bag in the cramped space behind the pilot’s seat.

The droid chirped in affirmation. Poe climbed the ladder to get into the cockpit and strapped on his helmet and seatbelt. Around him, he saw the rest of Black Squadron doing the same. They would follow their leader out of D’Qar, leading the evacuation effort. The X-wings were the Resistance’s first line of defense in case they came under attack while traveling.

“Let’s go, guys!” he shouted into his comms. The engine of Black One fired up and after BB-8 concluded that everything was in working order, Poe lifted off. 

The darkness of space was almost welcoming after staring up at the sky of D’Qar for hours, half-expecting the First Order to show up and blot out the sunlight overhead. Poe could see the calm all around him and breath for now. It was unlikely after such a devastating loss from Starkiller that the First Order would have the time and organization to launch a counterattack immediately.

He sent a message back to the base. “All clear.”

It took nearly an hour for everyone to leave atmo. In that time, Black Squadron continued their patrol and saw no threats along the horizon. 

“Ready for lightspeed jump,” General Organa’s voice sounded in his ear. Poe pressed a couple of buttons to prep and watched as one by one, the Resistance vanished.

Black One shook with the pull of moving at the speed of light. The stars streaked across his viewport, leaving a pattern of lights the only thing he could see. It would be a few hours before they got to Crait.

“Good job, Bee,” he told the droid. “Just relax for now, buddy.”

He slumped back in his seat, wondering if he could get a quick nap in for the meantime.

* * *

The touchdown on Crait went about as smoothly as they could have hoped. They experienced no losses and no signs of the First Order tracking them.

Poe quickly climbed out of his X-wing and looked around on the blinding white surface of the planet. He felt the ground beneath his feet, noticing the graining, rough texture of the earth and how it seemed to be barren soil.

Oh, wait. This wasn’t soil, he realized once he knelt down and touched the ground. This was salt.

Around him, the weary pilots, soldiers and technicians unloaded from their transports, nodding their acknowledgement and thanks to the Resistance volunteers who had already been stationed here and came out to help. Poe reached in to grab his bag as BB-8 lowered himself to the ground.

From a distance, he could see a reunion taking place between old friends. General Calrissian and General Organa spoke to each other, their heads bowed in sorrow. No doubt Leia was telling him of Han’s passing. The tales of Han Solo and Lando Calrissian’s work in the Rebellion was almost as legendary as their cons.

Lando held his arms open and embraced Leia. Then, after a few moments, they broke apart, and he offered the same to Kaydel. There was an unspoken rule in the Resistance to keep to a respectable politeness to anyone you knew to be grieving. Instead of swarming around the leadership to ask for direction, everyone was waiting to give the three their space.

Then, once they started to converse with others, Poe took it as his queue to walk over to them to await further instruction.

“Ah, Commander Dameron,” Leia greeted. “Glad you’re here. Lando was going to show us the facilities.”

"This used to be an old mining colony,” Lando added. “We’ve been working on fixing the place up since we landed here, but the routes are still pretty confusing.” 

A small group followed behind them as General Calrissian led the impromptu tour. He took them down a slope, into a tunnel cut into the red earth of the world. 

“This place was abandoned because a labor dispute ate up the profit margin,” he explained. “But Crait experiences heavy winds, which pick up salt and create what we call crystal storms, so the company had blast doors installed into the facility to protect the equipment. It’s why it interested the Rebellion way back when.”

“Back before hyperspace travel was invented,” Leia snarked. “Lando, you’re making us sound like fossils.”

Lando smirked at her as he continued. “Well, anyway, Leia’s father only had to add an orbital bombardment shield to the mines to make it an adequate base, but it never became a true Rebellion nest.” He shot Leia another look.

She rolled her eyes. “Yes, yes.” She waved her hand dismissively. “I was sixteen and stupid. We all were young once.”

Poe felt his eyebrows raise. There was a story there, but now probably wasn’t the time to ask. 

They continued deeper into the mines, learning where the makeshift barracks were, where to find medical supplies and food, all the necessities. Lando wasn’t kidding when he described the place as a maze. There were so many tunnels and turns, Poe was certain he would need a map to get around. Luckily, BB-8 was taking care of that problem by memorizing the mines in his memory bank.

The tour was in the section set aside for artillery, when a low rumble shook the base. The Resistance members looked back and forth between one another, before trying to find cover. Poe knew what this meant, but he hoped it wasn’t exactly like he thought it was.

He ran out of the artillery storage, hoping for answers. “Bee, can you show me the way back to Operations?” he asked. Lando and Leia were following him, but they were not as quick.

His droid pushed his engine to run faster, rolling his body over the ground as rapidly as possible to stay ahead of the humans. BB-8 turned down one corridor and then another, his memory chip aiding him in finding his way.

The group inside the room that looked like it was once a control center for incoming flight traffic was huddled over a single console, looking like the blood had drained from their faces.

Poe knew fear when he saw it. He had been a pilot far too long not to know better. From what he could tell, Leia and Lando understood this too.

“What is it?” Leia inquired.

“The First Order,” a Blutopian technician replied. “They’re attacking our shields.”

Poe felt his heart drop into his stomach. “How’d they find us?”

No one answered. Poe would be hard-pressed to believe the First Order had been able to follow through a lightspeed jump. It seemed even less likely they knew about Crait beforehand, else they would have already attacked the base.

After running the situation through his head, he could think of a few likely causes that would lead to discover, but it seemed Lando had already thought of at least one of the same ideas. He entered in a code on his comm link, prompting an immediate response from the base.

“I just sent the order to search every transport in the facility,” he explained. “We’ve been tracked somehow.” He looked at Commander Dameron. “Get your squad together and have them search their X-wings too.” Then, he turned back to his team. “Close the blast doors.”

Nodding, Poe went straight to the hangar. He found Black Squadron helping with unloading the new arrival’s cargo while staring nervously at the sky and waved to them. They gathered around him and then, after hearing what Lando ordered for the rest of the base, scattered to look around all the transports in the area.

It was less than five minutes for Jessika Pava to come back, eyes wide and ashamed as she held out her hand and gave something to Poe. He inspected the smashed device in his hand and frowned. It was a tracker.

“Where did you find this?”

“On my X-wing,” she admitted. “It must have been attached when we were on Starkiller.”

And that made a lot of sense. In the chaos of dogfighting TIEs, it would have been easy for the enemy to deploy a tracker to attach to an X-wing with no one noticing. Then, in the subsequent flurry of activity surrounding the evacuation, there was no time to inspect the starfighters before leaving again.

“I’ll notify the generals,” he sighed, hoping this wouldn’t reflect negatively on him.


	16. Chapter 16

Finn couldn’t sleep.

He tried, but after feeling the Force that morning he felt wired and excited. Never in his life had he seen, _experienced,_ something like this. It almost made him feel like he was in on some great secret, one that only a few were privileged to.

Now that he understood just how full of life the island was, he wanted to explore it, see the creatures and the plants for himself. There was light too, a source that Luke said came from the first Jedi temple that once stood. Finn never noticed anything that resembled ruins when he and Rey made their first exploration to find Luke. Perhaps nothing but that light was left of the temple. Seemed a bit of a shame to him. He would have liked to be able to see something that showed the island’s ancient past.

Across from him, in the other bunk, Rey was sound asleep. He hoped he wasn’t making too much noise. 

Back in the First Order, if he couldn’t get to sleep, the best thing he could do was stay silent and listen to the anthems and speeches playing softly over the intercom of each barrack. Here, there was only the low hum of the _Falcon’s_ temperature control system to serenade him.

If he couldn’t get to sleep, he thought, the next best thing to do would be to get up and do something. He wasn’t sure what to touch around the _Falcon,_ but with all the tools and gear left out along the floor of the entire ship, he was hesitant to mess with anything.

A walk might be nice. Except in the ocean, Finn didn’t get a sense that any predators dangerous to a human were hiding around the island. It was probably safe to be wandering around at night. Maybe he would even spot some nocturnal birds.

In the distance, he could see the faint glow of a fire on a far cliff and tried to think about what was over there. He knew Luke stayed in a hut around there and wondered perhaps he wasn’t the only person up right now. Maybe he could use the company.

As much as the hike up the stairs still winded him and made him a little embarrassed—because surely a stormtrooper who had only left the ranks a few days before would be in good enough shape to do this without needing to stop every few minutes—Finn didn’t give up on the hike. He hoped Rey didn’t wake up and find him gone. He really didn’t want to worry her. Part of him thought she would have wanted more time alone with Luke so she could get to know her father better, but they only talked alone the first night here and their conversation during the day was more like an exchange of pleasantries between strangers.

But that was the thing wasn’t it? They basically were strangers. He had believed there would have been more affection between the two, but neither really knew each other. Luke had a few baby stories to tell Rey, and she could only tell him about a childhood he had no part in.

Would it be the same for Finn if he ever met his birth parents? Not that he hoped for that to happen, the odds were extremely low after all, but from time to time the thought struck him. He wasn’t sure how old he was when he was taken, but it had to be very young. He had no memories of a life beyond cold steel corridors and lifeless white helmets.

As much as he hated to admit it and harbored no ill feelings towards her, Finn was a little jealous of Rey. She already found her family again and had a chance to know them. He couldn't help but feel happy for her, but he wished he could have it just as easy as she did in his search for his past.

The village of huts was alive and… rather loud. Finn squinted to see what the commotion was. It didn’t look like humans were dancing around the fire but he had been under the impression that Luke was the only civilized lifeform here.

Approaching the settlement, he hoped the creatures were friendly, or at least, would not perceive Finn as a threat. 

He was surprised to see that they were squat little things, that maybe went up to his hip in height. Amphibian in trait, they were gray with fleshy, wrinkled skin and twig-like feet that reminded him of birds. They wore clothes made from rough linen and appeared to be a traditionalist culture. The females wore light colored dresses with habits, while the males wore darker trousers and tunics. At one end of the settlement, he could smell fish cooking while the creatures danced together. They were celebrating, but Finn wasn’t sure why or what.

This time, at least he heard Luke approaching, his heavy footsteps thudding against stone.

“The men go out to sea to gather food,” he explained. “They’re gone for months every year. They returned this morning, on the other side of the island.”

“What are they?” Finn asked.

“I’m not sure what they call themselves, but I’ve been calling them the Caretakers. The women watch over this island, care for it. They know what stood here long ago.”

This puzzled Finn. “But if the Jedi temple is gone, why do they stay?”

“That’s what I’ve wondered for a while.” Luke shrugged. “Perhaps this is where they consider home, temple or no temple.”

Finn wouldn’t know. Home had never been a word in his personal vocabulary. He never stayed on one world for more than a year or two, sometimes, he would move every few months. Thinking of living somewhere without a purpose behind it was a difficult concept for him.

It seemed like Luke had caught on to whatever expression he made. “Do you know where you come from, Finn?” he asked. “The world you were born on?”

Shaking his head, Finn frowned. “That information was never shared with stormtroopers, at least, not the ones who couldn’t remember where they were from. Either you remembered or you didn’t.”

“That’s too bad,” said Luke. “I bet there’s someone out there missing you.”

“If anyone is still alive.” Finn shrugged. Suddenly, he felt the darkness of the night was weighing him down. “I know early on, the First Order used to exterminate worlds when they claimed them for themselves. Took the kids and claimed the natural resources. Started the world from scratch.”

The Jedi Master’s face blanched with horror. “We knew—that is, my sister and I knew—what was happening in some worlds. Bespin was one of the first to be attacked, but they mostly survived. Their kids were taken. We searched for any sign of them but found nothing. And the New Republic—”

“—Did nothing,” Finn finished for him. “I know. The Order was counting on that in the early days.”

“If we had known what else they were doing, we would have brought that as evidence.” His voice tightened into a rasp before he stared at Finn with haunted eyes. “I’m sorry, Finn.”

“You didn’t know that part,” Finn reminded him. “And well, I’m here now. I might be the only one to leave and survive, but I did.”

“Indeed, which brings me to something I’ve been wanting to ask: what made you want to leave?”

Staring at the warm glow of the fire, Finn recalled the burning village and the screams of those who lived in it. He felt sick when he was there, and he still was queasy to think about it. The closest thing he had to a friend was dead in the sand and more and more bodies were lying on the ground by the minute.

When he found himself being rallied into a circle surrounding the remaining civilians, he was faced with a choice: kill innocents or die for not doing so.

And then he heard that voice that already got him in _so much trouble_ before.

_You don’t have to shoot. You have a choice._

Finn made that choice. It launched straight into a mess that he had to clean up quickly or escape. Then he made that choice too.

Still, hearing voices was never a good thing, or at least, that’s what he was under the impression of. Even worst to say you followed their directions. But he thought of how he felt the Force today and somehow, the voice reminded him of what he experienced. It was otherworldly and welcoming, like he was connected to something bigger and the galaxy was looking out for him.

He had a suspicion that Luke would understand, and if he didn’t well, maybe he would at least not judge.

“I was on Jakku, standing in a circle around civilians I was supposed to execute, when I heard a voice,” he confessed. Luke looked interested, but said nothing. “It told me I didn’t have to shoot them; I had a choice.”

“And you made the right one,” Luke assured him. “And you kept making the right choices. I assume that’s why you’re here now.”

Hesitation filled him when he pondered what to say next. Finn had been side-stepping himself about where to go from here but he only saw two options. The Resistance already seemed to think he was one of them, but the urge to take Rey and run to the Outer Rim was strong. He didn’t exactly leave one military power because he wanted to join another.

“I’m only here because of Rey,” he confessed. “We were going to run away to the Outer Rim together just a few days ago, and then all this happened. I guess I’ve just been following her around.”

When the Jedi Master looked at him funny, Finn balked and wanted to hide. Luke corrected himself right away.

“Sorry,” he said, running a metal hand through unkept hair. “It’s kind of weird to listen to someone talk about running away with my daughter, who I just found out was still alive.” He shook his head rapidly, as if to wake himself up, and then cleared his throat. “Uh… well, I guess you’ve got a lot to think about then.”

“I’ll be honest, I don’t exactly want to fight the First Order but everyone seems to think I do. What they don’t understand is, I left because I didn’t want to kill anyone. Now I feel like I’m being asked to kill my classmates.” He gulped, the image of Nines’s unseeing, dead gaze swimming around him. The only consolation he had about killing his former teammate was that, if he hadn’t, Nines would have certainly killed him. Still, it didn’t have to end like that. 

Luke put a comforting hand on his shoulder. It reminded him of Han, when he warned Finn that eventually, Rey would learn that he lied about being Resistance. For a while, she thought of him as a hero and it made him feel good. He wanted to feel like that, to see her look at him like that.

“You get to make that choice too,” Luke assured him. “Leia isn’t going to force you to join. But I want you to know, when I heard your story, I was impressed and well, proud for you. Even back in the Rebellion, I’d never met a stormtrooper who decided to lay down his weapon despite his orders. But here you are, standing right in front of me. A man who said no to the First Order, who was directly responsible for my daughter to find her way back to me.” He sighed.

“I noticed you and Rey aren’t really getting close,” Finn observed. “Not to sound mean, or anything. It’s just… both of you want to have a relationship with one another, I can tell.”

Back slumping, Luke turned away for a moment. “We don’t really know each other. She… well, I haven’t seen her since she was five. We have a lot to talk about, but I don’t know where to start.”

“She seemed to have taught herself something about the Force, maybe start there?” Finn suggested.

A grin spread across the Jedi’s face. “I’m not one to say the Force wills everything, but this time, I think it might have. You’ve done a very brave thing, Finn, and I know you’re not sure what you want to do from here, but I know whatever you choose, it’ll also be the right thing. For you.”

He patted Finn one more time on the back before he excused himself. It was getting really late now, and Luke had a feeling that someone on the _Falcon_ had already noted his absence. 

As he made his way back down to the landing space, Finn felt odd. Not sick, but like something wasn’t right. He stopped on the stairs to catch his breath and looked around. There wasn’t anything amiss though. The island was still quiet as its inhabitants slept.

Continuing, it was only a few steps more when he turned a slight corner and found himself face to face with Kylo Ren.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tee-hee. Look what I did! This chapter, you get a cliffhanger!


	17. Chapter 17

The glare Snoke gave him when he returned from Medical told Kylo Ren that his position was in jeopardy. 

The Supreme Leader was not one for pleasantries or small talk, and neither was Ren. Their exchanges were often brief and straight to the point unless it involved a lesson about the Dark Side. This time was no different.

They were quiet for a minute as Snoke looked at the thin bacta patch running down Ren’s face. The scavenger left her mark on him, a reminder of his defeat. He did not expect someone cut off from the more knowledgeable beings of the galaxy to be so strong in the Force. 

“You’ve failed, apprentice,” Snoke said, coldly.

Ren could not stop himself. “I _killed_ Han Solo, master. That was what you told me to do.”

“You may have done that, but you failed an even greater task. Without the map, the Resistance can find Luke Skywalker and call the last Jedi back to battle. The First Order does not know where he is.” He pointed with accusation to Ren. “And all because of your arrogance.”

“Master!” Ren protested. “It was all the girl—”

“Do not remind me of the scavenger,” Snoke warned, his voice booming. “She is also _your_ failure. A girl who had never held a lightsaber before defeated you, a student with years of experience. Perhaps _she_ would make a more obedient apprentice.”

Blood boiling under his skin, Ren did not attempt to hide his rage.

“Then I will kill her when I find her! I just need to know true power, what you promised to show me when I killed Solo!”

Lightning erupted from Snoke’s fingers, shooting towards Ren and leaving him writhing on the floor in pain. This was not the first time he was punished, but certainly the most painful. It only made him angrier. 

“Skywalker will be found because of you! By the wrong people! He turned the tide of war thirty years ago, do you not think he will now?”

“Skywalker is an old man,” Ren reminded him. He knew better than anyone. Snoke too, was an old man. Ancient and towering, but weak. He wasn’t walking like he used to. Snoke might have been hiding this from the rest of the First Order, but Ren knew better. One day, the Supreme Leader would die.

And someone else would have to take his place.

“I thought someone would rise to put an end to the Jedi,” Snoke continued. “I thought that someone would be you.” He was showing regret now, another weakness of old men. “But you are no Vader; just a child in a mask.”

Ren became blinded with anger. So much so, that he didn’t see the warriors in black approaching or the smirk that Snoke flashed.

Four Knights of Ren surrounded him. He didn’t need to look at them to know which ones were there. Vicrul the Death Bringer. Cardo the Sharpshooter. Ushar the Berserker. Trudgen the Trophy Hunter. These were all his allies, sworn to follow Kylo Ren. Now, they had betrayed him for Snoke.

They led him to the turbolift outside the throne room and gripped his helmet in his hands. The unseeing gaze stared at him, almost like it was silently mocking him. He growled, rage no longer contained, and then smashed it into the wall of the lift repeatedly.

The Knights did nothing but observe him in silence.

The lift came to a stop, and the doors slid open. Ren exited and glared at the Knights to stop them from following. He would remember this betrayal. 

Retreating to his quarters, he stared at the melted remains of Darth Vader’s helmet. Of all people, Ren knew he was most deserving of Vader’s legacy and Snoke was holding him back. Once, his master whispered words of encouragement to him, empowered him to destroy the school of a new generation of Jedi. Now, that same master was keeping him from completing his training. 

There were two options in front of him, but he had to choose wisely.

As he was thinking through his next moves, the world around him suddenly seemed to spin. He wondered if he needed to make another trip to Medical. Ren’s stomach flipped, making him feel ill. 

Turning around, he saw a distorted figure had appeared in his quarters. He squinted to remember who it was until he recalled the final night on Starkiller.

FN-2187, the traitor.

He appeared just as confused as Ren and appeared unarmed. Unclipping his lightsaber, Ren ignited it and reveled in the fear on the man’s face when he was caught off guard.

_“Make another move and I’ll shoot you in the head,”_ a voice said behind him. Ren wondered if there was something wrong with him. Everything sounded like it was underwater.

Tilting his head slightly, he saw the scavenger stand behind him, a blaster aimed for him. Just like FN-2187, she didn’t look right. The room was distorted and so was she. 

_“Rey,”_ said the traitor. _“What’s happening?”_

_“I don’t know,”_ she admitted.

Ren swallowed. “It’s the Force, I think. We’ve been… connected somehow.” This was impossible, he told himself. He’d heard of this technique before, but it was incredibly dangerous to someone who wasn’t experienced. Both the traitor and the scavenger had barely a grasp on the Force.

“How are you doing this?” he asked, not expecting either to answer. “The effort would kill you.” Then he turned back to the scavenger and glanced curiously around her. She looked like she was in his quarters, but his logic told him she wasn’t really here. “Can you see my surroundings?” he asked them.

He could tell his unconcerned attitude was annoying her. FN-2187 probably felt the same way. Good. 

_“You’re going to pay for what you did,”_ warned the traitor, but Ren paid him no mind.

“I can’t see yours,” he continued to muse, turning to the other man to confirm his side of the room was the same. This must be something other than the technique he’d only read about.

The scavenger was growing impatient. Her cheeks puffed up with air as she raised her arm again.

He heard the blaster go off and raised his saber to help deflect any attack. There was no way he was in any danger, though.

A metallic _clang_ behind him startled him, forcing him to look away from the scavenger for a moment. A thin stream of smoke rose from the bolt hole that burst into the wall opposite him. 

When he turned back, he found both the scavenger and the traitor had vanished.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ho-ho-ho. The plot thickens!
> 
> See you next week!


	18. Chapter 18

Rey lowered her blaster, shaking as she stared with wide eyes at the empty space in front of her.

Kylo Ren had been right there, though she was not sure now if he really was there after all. Part of her was wondering if her fear was making her crazy, but she saw Finn too, didn’t she? It was why she was out here in the first place. She woke up and found Finn wasn’t in the _Falcon._

But Finn wasn’t here either. All she could see was the night sky, gray stone beaches, and dark water.

She wandered down to the beach, hoping that maybe Finn had just taken a late night stroll. Hopefully, she wouldn’t miss him.

Her walk took her up to the grassy slopes of the islands, out to a long and flat outcropping of gray stone overlooking the sea. She spotted a hole, covered with reddish moss. 

Even with the air being cool, Rey didn’t feel cold. Now, staring into the hole and seeing nothing but darkness, a shiver went down her spine. The darkness of the island located here, though she wasn’t sure why. Nonetheless, she could feel its pull, a seductive offer of power for those who dared to explore it.

She understood Luke wouldn’t want her to be here and she didn’t need a voice in her head to tell her to be careful. Turning, she intended to go back to her search for Finn.

But then, she slipped. On her knees, she felt the darkness drag her down.

Hitting the water tossed her body into shock. At first, she didn’t register how cold it was, but she couldn’t move her limbs. Gasping for air and only swallowing freezing salt water, she panicked.

Finally, after what seemed like minutes, Rey was able to kick her legs to propel herself up to the surface. It was a clumsy attempt;she didn’t know how to swim, but if she didn’t try, she knew she would drown.

Breathing in air brought a sense of relief to her and she did her best to float herself and paddle awkwardly with her arms to a slick, flat, and smooth stone. It took her a couple of tries to pull herself up.

Giving herself a moment to catch her breath, she looked around to find she fell into some place like a cave. It was long and narrow, likely something the sea had carved away for centuries. Except for a blowhole in the top side of the cave, there was no way to see outside the cavern. As the tide came in, the cave would flood. Rey kept that in mind as she searched for the easiest way out. She didn’t know much about tides, but understood enough to realize if she was still here when it came in, she would drown.

Then she noticed behind her that the walls of the cave had been grounded away and polished by the waves, leaving the impression that she was looking into black glass. As glossy as it was, she could see her reflection in it. In each shard of stone, another Rey looked back at her. There must have been a thousand Reys.

The Force quivered here. She grew uncomfortable as she got a sense she was being watched.

It felt like her world was being warped again, like back when she saw the strange blurred versions of Kylo Ren and Finn. She was _inside_ the stone, surrounded by replicas of herself, but still, a shivering girl sat outside, staring in.

She was panicking again. What if she couldn’t get out? Each time she turned her head, the other Reys did the same. She pondered if she was just one of the reflections and that, when the girl outside left, she would vanish with the rest.

Rey stretched her hand out and allowed her finger tips to touch the surface of the mirror. Around her fingers, the stone turned to liquid and rippled.

_“Where is she!?”_

Electricity shot out around her. Trying to get down to the floor, Rey found she was frozen in place. She thought of Kylo Ren and his ability to hold her with the Force, how she thought he was going to suffocate her. But she could breath, which meant this wasn’t his doing.

 _“We don’t know where she is now!”_ a woman screamed. _“Please!”_

 _“You hid her somewhere!”_ Rey could not see the figure under dark robes, who was approaching a shaking woman lying on the ground. Against the black rough tile, her blonde hair contrasted as it splayed along it. Rey had seen her before, when she touched the lightsaber. This was the woman who gave her away to Luke Skywalker to protect her.

This was the woman who gave birth to her.

 _“I don’t know where she was taken!”_ she pleaded. _“That’s the truth!”_ She screamed again as a bolt of lightning struck her.

This time, a man appeared beside her. Her father. He reached for his wife and held her.

 _“We don’t know anymore,”_ he said, almost calmly. _“What we told you is all we know.”_ There was acceptance in his eyes, like he knew what was about to happen already. And whatever that fate was, he accepted it. _“Let her go, please.”_

The figure tapped his foot against the floor impatiently. _“Then I have no use for either of you anymore.”_

A pale, wrinkled, and skeletal hand reached out from underneath the black fabric of the robe. A last shot of electricity, this one too strong for torture without causing major damage, branched out at the couple.

Rey screamed, closing her eyes so she wouldn’t see what came next. She screamed until she felt the world shift around her, until a familiar, suffocating heat enveloped her.

Another scream filled her ears. She opened her eyes to see a little girl with three hair buns run as fast as she could go, trying to get away from her pursuer. 

The alien following her almost reminded Rey of Maz Kanata, with orange skin and a flat, sunken face, but he was taller than Maz and she could see nothing that resembled her kindness and patience within him. He had implants in his head, though Rey hadn’t the slightest idea of what they could be for.

 _“Come back here, girl!”_ he shouted. _“I only have orders to bring you in alive. They never said anything about you being in one piece.”_

He held a club in his hands as he pursued her.

Rey turned her gaze to the man’s ship. It was an interstellar transport, with two forward cannons and silver body. She remembered seeing this ship over and over in her memory, the one that flew out of sight while Rey remained alone in the desert.

For years, she had assumed the ship belonged to her parents. Here, she was seeing a different story.

The man drew close to the little girl. She was quick, but he was faster, stronger. He gripped his hand tightly around her arm.

She screamed again, trying to shake herself away. _“Let me go!”_

The man raised his club. Rey braced herself to see the worst.

But the man froze up, almost the same way Rey currently felt. His club fell to the ground as he slowly but frantically brought his free hand up to his neck. He gulped for air, but could not breathe.

He let go of the girl who was holding her hand out as if she could defend herself from the impact of the weapon.

She glanced up and fearfully watched as her kidnapper choked. Looking down at her hand, she began to shake.

In a few moments, her attacker fell to his knees, then face down on the ground. A few minutes later, he twitched one last time before he went still. Both Reys looked on in horror.

Young Rey walked up to the body of her kidnapper, shaking. _“I didn’t mean—”_ she said to herself. _“What did I do?”_ She started sobbing.

Another figure was approaching, large and blobby. Unkar Plutt, though younger here, was unmistakable. In the distance, she could see the gateposts of Niima, the one she destroyed only a few days ago.

 _“What’s all the commotion?”_ the Croulate asked as he stared at the body on the ground before he turned to the girl.

“I—I—” she stood where she was, in shock.

Plutt turned the body over and inspected it. _“Must have been the heat. Not the first time I’ve seen some species just collapse in it.”_ He looked at Rey again. _“What was his relationship to you?”_

The girl didn’t understand and shrugged. 

_“Not a parent,”_ Plutt assumed. _“Was he transporting you? Did you work for him?”_

 _“No.”_ Rey was still sobbing.

The Coulate clicked his tongue. _“Do you know where you were heading to?”_

_“No.”_

Plutt’s kindness ended there. _“A shame. Well, then, I guess you’ll have to come with me. You can work for your meals and shelter until we figure out what to do with you.”_ He stared at the body. _“I’ll send someone out to bury him. Unless you know his name…? No?”_

Rey shook her head again.

Putting his blubbery arm around her back, Plutt led her away to a scary, unknown world; one she would soon learn was cruel and unforgiving. She rubbed at her eyes and the tears on her cheeks before she started looking back at the person who brought her there.

 _Rey,_ a voice whispered to her, trying to soothe her. _Be brave… and don’t look back._

She turned her head back to look ahead and quietly went with the stranger.

 _“Interesting,”_ a more familiar, deep voice said behind her. _“I’ve never heard of a child with that much strength…”_

Suddenly finding that she could move again, Rey twirled around to see Kylo Ren standing behind her. He was distorted again. She wasn’t sure if he was really here or if this was the mirror’s doing.

“You!” she called out, feeling her face redden.

He paid her no mind as he walked deeper into the darkness, finally stopping to take a seat on a metallic throne that had just fade into existence. Kylo stared straight at her. _“Apprentice,”_ he called out.

She jumped when flickering red light ignited beside her. Another figure appeared, one dressed all in black that she was starting to have trouble telling all these images apart. The person took a few steps forward, before it lowered itself to the ground to show the man on the throne respect. The lightsaber, an unfamiliar design to Rey with duel blades, rested neatly in their lap. 

Another pale hand reached out and pushed the hood back. Rey jumped away when she glimpsed herself under it. It was an older version of herself, and sicklier in appearance, with sunken, dark skin around her eyelids. 

Kylo raised his hand and beckoned her forward. Without hesitation, this other Rey stood up and took her place next to him. 

They stood together, watching as the galaxy erupted into blaster fire and flames.

The real Rey started sobbing, covering her eyes with her hands. She wanted this all to go away. She wanted to leave this place, but she was stuck here and nothing was going to get her out and—

“Rey?”

A gentle hand pressed against her back. Around her, the mirror shook. The glass cracked, chipping away until suddenly, everything shattered.

Next thing she knew, she was crouched on the ground, her hands covering her eyes and tucked into her knees as she sobbed. 

And someone was holding her. She knew who.

“Who were my parents?” she demanded from Luke, even as she cried. 

He remained silent for a moment, like he was debating how to answer her. Finally, he told her as forward as he could be.

“Their names were Maeva and Shio Taril,” he replied. “But your father changed his name and took his wife’s last name. For most of his life, he was known as Sheev Palpatine II.”

She gasped and glanced up. It felt like she was back in the freezing water again. “I—I’m a—” 

Luke nodded. “Only by blood, and that hardly matters. Your father was a clone with slightly altered DNA to pass as Palpatine’s legitimate heir. Problem was, he didn’t inherit the Force-sensitivity the Emperor wanted. When he was older and show no signs of using the Force, Palpatine abandoned him.”

If he thought that would take the sting away, it didn’t help. Rey was feeling sick now.

“He called himself Shio, and with his education, worked for the Imperial Department of Children and Families on Naboo. He might have worked for the Empire, but he was a good person. He didn’t agree with a lot of the politics of the Imperials. He and your mother met working there, in fact.”

Rey thought everything through and calmed a little. If her father never used his background for his own gain, if he tried to hide it, that was something at least.

“And when I was born, I showed signs of being Force-sensitive right away,” she guessed. Still, it didn’t make much sense to her. The Emperor died decades before she was born, and Naboo was one of the first member-worlds of the New Republic. 

Luke furrowed his brow. “It’s complicated,” he said, as if that cleared everything up. “I had never seen a baby so strong in the Force. When they first contacted me, they told me what you were—who you were—and that a group of ex-Imperials, worshippers of the dark side, were plotting to take you. They were scared for you and we agreed it was too dangerous for you to stay with them. I volunteered to adopt you and hide you. They were going to feign an accident to say you died. If it ever became safe again, they would return to claim you.”

“And then they died,” Rey finished.

He nodded. “And then they died. I don’t know the whole story there.”

She told him what she glimpsed in the mirror. How they had been taken to a place full of darkness and tortured. She described the man in black robes as best she could, but noted she never saw his face.

“He killed them,” she concluded. “He used… lightning, I think? _Force_ lightning.”

“The dark side can grant this power,” Luke agreed. “But now, I’m even more confused. The Sith used that skill and now, they’re gone. Perhaps another group of dark siders have risen in their place.”

Thinking back to the memory of Kylo Ren, how he forced himself to break into her mind, reminded her of the dark side. Only then, did she remember that long ago, she had done something just as terrible with the Force. Intentional or not, she had killed someone. And now, she was learning she was a blood descendent of one of the evilest men to ever be alive in the galaxy. Part of her wondered if maybe it was her destiny to do bad things, even if she didn’t intend to. A lot of people had good intentions but bad luck, why not her?

And here was Luke Skywalker, her parental grandfather’s enemy, who had found kindness in himself to take her in and call her a daughter.

“After everything Palpatine did, how could you even look at me, knowing who I was?” she asked. “Let alone offer to raise me?”

Holding up his metal hand, Luke shot her a thoughtful smile. “Who am I to judge?” he said. “After all, my father was Darth Vader.”

With that last sentence, Rey finally understood. 

“I killed a man,” she confessed, only to regret bringing it up when her adopted father turned pale. “It was the person who took me from you, I think.” She described the alien man and his ship.

“Ochi,” Luke breathed. “It was him all along.”

“What?”

Clearing his throat, he stood up and looked out at the moon sitting over the ocean. “When you were a baby, my friend, Lando Calrissian lost his children in an attack by a group of ex-Imperials. I assume they were the beginnings of the First Order. We searched the galaxy for those kids, finally losing the trail with a man named Ochi of Bestoon, a former Sith assassin. Later, when you were taken, the trail to finding you went connected to his name… and the trail went cold again.”

“He’s in an unmarked grave somewhere on Jakku,” she told him. “I… I used the Force on accident. Choked him. I ran from him and he gave chase. He was going to hurt me.”

Luke touched her shoulder again, rubbing it with his thumb. “That happens sometimes, especially with untrained children. They lose control of their powers. Still, you were defending yourself and no one would blame you for that.”

Looking up he walked over to a rope hanging down into the hole she fell down. That must be how he got in… and how they would get out. She wondered how he knew she was there. Did the Force tell him that?

And even if he didn’t think her to be bad because she killed a kidnapper, Rey couldn’t shake the fear that somewhere inside her, someone dangerous and evil was lurking. She didn’t tell him anything else, like about the voice who spoke to her frequently or how the dark side tempted her on Starkiller.

But somewhere in her mind, she started to view Luke Skywalker not as the Jedi Master, but the man who selflessly gave her a home and wanted to raise her. 

A father.

* * *

She and Finn hid away in their bunks when they reunited on the _Falcon_ later. So much had happened to the both of them that night, and Finn was just as shaken as she was.

“Do you think it was real?” Finn asked.

Laying on her bunk, she gazed at the ugly metal frame without blinking. “I—I don’t know.” She remembered how the blaster bolt shot out. How real Kylo Ren seemed. But then, it also didn’t feel real either, like the way gazing into the mirror had been.

Not to mention, Finn saw it too.

It couldn’t have been a weird dream, then. Rey didn’t know much about the Force, but she had never heard about dream sharing before. No, that had to have been something else.

“This island is weird, Finn.”

He snorted. “No need to tell me that. I think I just witnessed an…” He cleared his throat. “Well, never mind that.” 

Rey then told him about the mirror and that she saw how her parents died. “It reminded me of how we saw Ren,” she explained, though she left out the rest of the vision. She’d rather not bring up what she did again. A sudden thought struck her. “You think he knows where we are?” 

“Well…” Finn looked nervous. “He said he couldn’t see our surroundings, I think? I couldn’t see his.”

“Me either,” she agreed.

“So, I think we’re safe. For now.”

She lied back in her bunk, silent. There was too much to think about and she was feeling over the edge. It seemed Finn noticed her agitation; he quietly excused himself and left her alone.

It began to rain outside, and though Rey had every mindset to run out and feel it against her skin, she was too exhausted to get up. Besides, it was probably cold, and she was done being wet and cold for the night.

Somehow, between her frantic thoughts and fear, she fell asleep. The rain might have helped, with its soft pattering lulling her. Her awareness deepened into blackness as her consciousness slipped away.

And then, Kylo Ren was staring right at her.

She wanted to groan, but she was wary of the man in front of her. He tried coming closer, reaching out to touch her, but she flinched and stomped her foot to stop him.

“You aren’t really here,” she told him, if only just to remind herself. “You can’t touch me. I’m safe.”

 _“For someone who’s safe,”_ he observed, _“you’re awfully afraid. I can see it in your eyes.”_ Gaze on her, he circled her, studied her. _“This is remarkable,”_ Ren mused. _“I have never heard of something like this. And that vision—the one where you killed that man—did that really happen?”_

Rey didn’t answer him.

 _“I’ve never seen a child so young with that kind of power,”_ he continued before he stopped to state directly at her. _“The dark side has been calling you since, I can tell.”_ Then, he broke into an amused grin. _“You have that look in your eyes. From the forest. When you called me a monster.”_

Stepping forward again, Rey met him by stepping backwards. She wondered what would happen if they intersected. Would she see into his mind again? Would they vanish? What made her even more uncomfortable was the thought they might be able to touch.

“You are a monster,” she spat.

Tilting his chin upward, Ren looked down on her, pleased. _“Yes, I am,”_ he agreed. _“But this is what destiny has decided I should be. You could be more than just a scavenger,”_ his tone of voice became eerily pleasant. _“The dark side could make that happen.”_

And then, just as quickly as he appeared, he vanished into the darkness. Rey thought she might wake up for her dream, but as exhausted as she was, she slipped further into its comfort.

* * *

What woke her up, was the sound of Finn shouting from the living area.

“Rey!” she thought she heard his muffled calls. “It’s the Resistance!”

Groggily, she jumped out of the bunk and stood on the floor dizzily. Part of her wondered, once again, if she had dreamed the whole encounter up, but she didn’t have time to question it.

“Finn?” she called out as she left the crew's quarters. “What is it?”

She didn’t see him at first, as she wandered around and grew worried. Running to the cockpit, she found Finn and Chewbacca hovering over the console.

“What’s going on?”

They peeled their eyes away for a moment to answer her.

“The Resistance sent us a message.” The way Finn said this made her realize that something was wrong.

“What’s happened?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And now, we finally have the full answer of who Rey's parents are! Who is that mysterious voice she hears? That is an answer for another time.


	19. Chapter 19

Poe lost count over how long it had been since he’d last slept. For the last few hours, he had been sitting over a radar, watching and waiting for an opening. Across from him, General Calrissian was doing the same, sipping on his third cup of caf in the last few hours.

“Anything new Commander Dameron?” he asked, looking like he wanted to start a conversation to pass the time more than anything.

“Nothing,” he replied. “Just picking up a bunch of TIE patrols.”

Calrissian nodded his head and leaned back in his seat. “This was always the worst part of war for me,” he admitted. “The waiting. I’d much rather be out there doing something.”

Poe hummed in agreement. He never enjoyed standing around when he could try to solve problems on his feet.

It appeared General Calrissian was thinking the same way. He kept writing something down in his datapad, looking up at the ceiling every so often as he was lost in thought. Then, after what seemed like ten minutes of restlessness, he stood up.

“I have an idea,” he announced. “Probably a bad one, but at least it’s something.”

Poe quirked a brow to show he was listening.

Lando ran a hand through his hair. “We’ve got some old ski speeders we use for patrol. Been here long before the Rebellion and were fitted with weapons to keep pirates at bay. We should save our fuel on our starfighters, but maybe we could use the speeders to clear out some of the TIE patrols.”

Not sure if that was the best idea, Poe weighed their options. If they did nothing, they would have to continue waiting for help while the First Order bombarded the base. Now, if they tried to clear the airspace a bit, they might have a chance of escaping. It would be risky, however. He didn’t know what exactly these weapon capabilities were, and the thought of trying out the old ski speeders both excited him and made him hesitant.

Still, if he were honest with himself, he’d much rather be doing something instead of sitting around a radar.

“All right, General. I’m game.”

Lando grinned. “Then let’s get a team together and get going.”

They gathered a group together comprising of the best pilots available. Poe grabbed some of his own team, with Lando bringing in Kaydel and a few other volunteers.

It seemed Kaydel was there on her own accord, and Lando continued to tell her to go back to Operations. “Your mother will have my head if anything happens to you!” he pleaded.

“But you need all the help you can get!” 

Marching in, General Organa was red in the face. “Kay, you’re needed here.”

“But Mom—”

Anyone who had been around General Organa enough knew she was no longer the woman who was so quick to anger, as she had been described in her youth. Years of politics and war had changed that about her. She understood how to channel that anger now, but that didn’t mean there were times where she just couldn’t contain it anymore.

“No buts. I need you back in Operations. We have to get another message out.”

Head hung, Kaydel shot Poe and Lando an apologetic look. She turned and walked out of eyesight.

Leia eyed everyone else in the area. “Thank you, for what you are trying to do. We’ll be monitoring their numbers. If we can make a clearing, we can try to evacuate.”

Then she followed in the direction her daughter went. The rest of the Resistance shot each other glances before Poe took a breath and moved forward. “Let’s get these speeders on the track,” he ordered, before moving to pull one of the ski speeders from where it was parked and walking it over to a track its wheels could follow, which would send it down a chute.

The rest of the group followed his lead, with Lando bringing up the rear. Poe hopped into the speeder and turned its engine on. It rumbled, its parts and frame aged, but it still was running at least. 

He drove forward until the track sloped and it carried him rapidly down the chute. The air grew cooler as he traveled down until light met his sight and he emerged outside. 

Now airborne, the speeder glided into the air, carrying him a distance away from the base and into the salt fields. Overhead, TIEs flew patterns into the sky, looking for the Resistance.

This was his chance. If they could shoot down a few TIEs before they were spotted…

The problem was—and Poe wished he had time to test out this ski speeder before he left—the speeder’s weapons had limited range and angling capabilities. Not to mention, once it touched the ground, it would no longer be in the air. If they couldn’t be on the same level as their enemy, this was going to be next to impossible.

Somehow, Lando caught up to him and skimmed the ground to his left. “Bet you’ve already figured out the quirks of these speeders,” he commented through their internal comms.

“Please tell me there’s a method to your madness,” Poe pleaded.

Singling out a TIE, Lando grinned and tailed it. Observing a master at work, Poe felt his mouth drop as General Calrissian physically rocked the speeder back and forth until it lifted into the air in a strange combination between a glide and a jump. He was just high enough that as he was momentarily gliding; he angled his shot directly below the TIE and made a direct hit, landing back on the ground seconds later.

Commander Dameron could not believe his eyes.

The TIEs took notice of the small group of Resistance speeders and gave chase. This would make things a lot harder for shooting down this patrol if the speeders were to mirror the technique Lando used. Everyone had to time themselves right and hope the TIEs didn’t get out of range by the time the speeders made the leap.

Scanning the field, Poe found a nearby TIE and focused on it. Copying Lando, he waited until he was directly under the Starfighter before he began to rock the speeder back and forth. This made him nervous as the clunky and aged machinery rumbled underneath him. He worried it was going to fall apart while he was inside.

Then, the speeder lurched as he made the leap and aimed for the TIE’s underside. Not falling for the same trick twice, the pilot of the Starfighter had the sense to move away, but they weren’t quick enough. Poe’s blast grazed against the wing, forcing the TIE to plummet to the ground in a plume of trailing smoke.

It was a short-lived victory, however, when he scanned the area again and saw how many TIEs were in the sky and how his squad was struggling to shoot them down. Seeing where he was in need, Poe drove his speeder forward.

* * *

She knew she only had minutes to get out of the hangar before her absence was noted.

Kaydel quietly crept closer to the nearby A-wing, cautiously keeping watch for anyone else to appear. She wasn’t supposed to be here, but she felt like she had no choice. Her friends needed her.

And somewhere, though she wasn’t sure where, her brother was watching. She was not sure why she sensed this—unlike her mother and brother, the Force had not taken to her—but she had a feeling he was nearby, circling the Resistance to end them just as he ended their father.

Slipping inside the cockpit, she entered in a code to open the hangar door. The nice thing about working in Operations was that if you were smart enough, you could get access to just about anything in the Resistance. She turned the engine on, hoping the rumbling wouldn’t give her away.

_“Kaydel Organa!”_

She flinched and chucked nervously. “Mom! I was just checking to make sure this one was working fine.” As if to illustrate the point of her lie, she turned the engine off and patted the console. “Purrs like a Loth-kitten.”

“Don’t even think that’s going to work on me.” General Organa placed her hands on her hips. “I know exactly what you’re doing.”

Defeated, Kaydel got out of the cockpit. “My friends need me,” she insisted.

“I need you more.”

Shocked, Kay looked her mother directly in the eye and glimpsed the beginnings of tears watering in the corners. Guilt overtook her.

“I’ve already lost your father and your brother. I can’t lose you too.”

If Kay’s heart could break any more than it already had, it was now. She felt herself fall into pieces. Her mother, strong, brave Leia Organa, former Princess of Alderaan, the Hutt Slayer, a long-serving New Republic Senator, and General of the Resistance, lost the calm but firey exterior she always kept. Kay had seen her mother in times of pain, shared in it, but never had she seen her mother so _shattered_ before.

She embraced her. “I’m sorry, Mom. I’ll stay here, I promise.” Kay felt so small, like a child again, but not in the usual way that made her angry. This time, her mother needed her child here.

They walked back to the Operations center together. A skeleton crew of technicians were huddled around a radar, on high alert. Everyone was waiting for word on General Calrissian and Commander Dameron’s attempt to clear the First Order blockade to attempt to escape Crait. If they could get out, perhaps they would be able to find a real safe place to hide out in while the Resistance regrouped.

Then, they heard Poe’s voice crackle over his comm link.

“General Organa?”

She walked over to the console and spoke into the mic. “What is it, Commander?”

“I sent Captain Wexley out to keep watch on the skies. What he’s found… well, we’re sending you some data…”

It was a rough holo projection, seemingly taken from a weak pic from a long distance, but Kaydel knew what the outline was the moment she saw it.

A Star Destroyer.

There was nothing unusual about a Star Destroyer being involved in a blockade. Surely Commander Dameron understood this?

No, there was something off about this one. She squinted at the picture. There looked to be a couple of dots surrounding it. TIEs, perhaps? Then she focused and observed the shape wasn’t right for Starfighters.

“Commander, I really hope I’m wrong,” her mother began, hesitantly. “But are those-?”

“Yes, m’am. They are.”

She cursed under her breath. “Is there any hope for finding an opening?”

Poe’s comms crackled. “Not at the moment. We’re calling off the effort now.”

His line went silent. The room was quiet, though a few people were squinting at the holo in confusion.

Leia pointed to the Star Destroyer. “This is a Star Destroyer,” she stated the obvious. “But these,” she pointed to the surrounding dots, “are also Star Destroyers.”

“So wait,” said one technician. “Does that mean there are miniscule Star Destroyers now?”

Kay could tell her mother had a terrible urge to shake the technician for his daftness, but refrained to keep her composure.

“Try the other way around,” she groaned.

The tech’s eyes widened. “You mean, that thing is that big?”

Well, that was what was on everyone’s minds, wasn’t it? With something that large in the blockade, there was no way the Resistance was going to break through without outside help.

Moving to the side, Leia sought out her daughter. She had a request in mind.

“Send a signal out to our allies,” she whispered. “We’re going to need all the help we can get.” Then, as an afterthought, she added, “Agent Tico too, if you can get her something encrypted. She needs to know what’s going on and maybe she has intel for us. She might need to lie low for a while.”

Kay nodded and moved to get right on it. At least she knew now that if she had gone out, it would have been a waste of time. And her friends were coming back, so that was giving her some peace of mind.

She wasn’t sure how long that peace would last though, with the First Order looming overhead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And here's another Poe chapter, featuring Lando being a general!


	20. Chapter 20

As soon as he explained what was going on, Rey ran out the _Falcon_ into the drizzly gray light of dawn, and went straight to retrieve Luke. They needed him if they were going to even think about helping the Resistance.

Finn couldn’t help but pace up and down the lounge of the _Falcon,_ panicked by Kaydel Organa’s message that sounded more like an S.O.S. than a warning. The First Order had tracked them to whatever world they fled to, and they needed reinforcements to help get them out.

He didn’t know what a light freighter with a small crew such as themselves could do, but there had to be something. 

Instead of pacing the ship corridors up and down, like he knew he would, Finn opted to lie down and wait for Rey to return. He closed his eyes, hoping to ward off the start of the headache pulsing at his temple.

What he got was another kind of headache.

The large visage of Kylo Ren appeared in front of him, standing like he’d been waiting there for a while.

“What do you want, Ren?” Finn spat.

 _“Just to talk.”_ Finn found that hard to believe. _“I want to know why the Force is connecting the three of us. You specifically.”_

“Why me?”

Circling him, Ren studied him up and down. _“You have the Force, that much is obvious. What isn’t to me is why I didn’t see it before? I should have sensed a stormtrooper with your level of power.”_

Finn rolled his eyes. “Maybe you just didn’t want to see it. Can’t say I see you being happy knowing a stormtrooper is your competition.” The Knights of Ren always looked down on the rest of the First Order, like they were superior to everyone else. They probably believed that too.

 _“Perhaps…”_ Ren mused. Finn could hardly believe he was agreeing with him. _“Had I known about you—about your ability—I would have offered to train you. You were such an example solider, the Knights of Ren would benefit from such an addition.”_

He was speaking in present tense. Finn didn’t like where this was going. He crossed his arms. 

“I’m not joining you.”

Smirking, Ren appeared like he was expecting this answer. _“I thought as much, but the offer is open. Skywalker failed me as a teacher and he will fail you too.”_

“You underestimate him.”

 _“Do I now?”_ An eyebrow quirked. _“Well, I shouldn’t be surprised that you would switch sides.”_ Walking away, Ren began to fade into the darkness. _“After all, it runs in your family.”_

Wait… he knew who Finn’s family was? His heart raced as his legs seemed to move on his own accord.

“Kylo!” he shouted, reaching out to the darkness only to find he was alone.

With a gasp, Finn woke from his nap, heart still racing. Sitting up, he took a deep breath and tried to calm himself. It was just a dream, he reminded himself. And if it were real, Ren was just baiting him.

Rey arrived back with Luke shortly after Finn got up again. Soaked to the bone, not only did they look cold, Rey was slightly limping.

“I slipped and fell on the stones going up,” she admitted. “They’re slippery in the rain. I think it’s just bruised.” She winced. “Badly.”

Nothing appeared out of place when he glanced at her leg, but Finn understood from basic first aid that she needed to stay off it for a while. He rushed them inside, waiting for Rey to slip away into the bunk to change into dry clothes. Since he had nothing to give Luke to change into, Chewbacca retrieved a towel for him to drape over himself and ty to dry off.

Hobbling back inside, Rey took a seat on the booth around the dejark table, a blanket wrapped around her. “You should stay off your leg for a while,” Finn advised. “Do you want to ice it?”

“I’m freezing,” she emphasized by tugging at the blanket. “Give me some time to warm up first.”

Luke stood where he was. “So, what’s this I hear about the Resistance being in trouble?”

Feeling like he was going to pace again, Finn took a seat next to Rey to try to keep himself from doing so. He took a breath before beginning, so he wouldn’t talk too fast.

“The message was brief.” Chewbacca nodded his head in agreement. “The Resistance sent coordinates and an S.O.S. They say they’ve been found by the First Order and a mega-class Star Destroyer is orbiting the planet they evacuated to. They need reinforcements.”

“A mega-class Star Destroyer?” Rey looked confused.

Finn nodded. “Imagine a typical Star Destroyer then enlarge it by five times that size.”

Her eyes widened. 

“The First Order only has one that I know of,” he continued. “It’s their flagship, the _Supremacy._ Originally, it was the home base of the Order, but then Starkiller replaced it. It’s like a city in space. Massive, full of tech and weapons. The Supreme Leader stays there too.”

This time, Luke had his own questions. “Supreme Leader?”

“Snoke,” Finn answered. “I’ve never seen him before. The cadets used to joke he wasn’t a real, but Kylo Ren works directly under him, so he must be.”

The Jedi Master’s eyes sunk to the ground. “Must be.” Finn wondered if Luke knew who convinced his nephew to betray him. If Finn had any credits, he would have placed his bet on Snoke. The mysterious leader was rarely seen outside of holo projections, but the rumors he possessed a dark and dangerous power were almost certainly true.

“What can we do?” Rey asked urgently. “We’re only one small ship…”

Chewbacca growled and Finn gazed to the others to translate. Luke frowned at his idea. “We can’t blow up a Star Destroyer by ourselves,” he retorted. “We don’t have the power for that.”

“Blowing things up certainly seems to work though,” Finn muttered, getting a laugh out of Rey. It gave him an idea, or at least, the start of one. He would have to give it a bit of pondering first.

 _Ah, you’re learning not to run head-first into everything,_ that mysterious voice of his consciousness chuckled. Finn wondered why it had gone quiet the last few days.

Luke glared at the two of them. “Don’t even think about it. I’ve done reckless things when I was your age. Sneaking onto Star Destroyers never goes the way you think.” He tilted his head in thought. “There’s someone I can call for help, if he’s not already with the Resistance.” Turning away, he went back to the cockpit, presumably to send out a message.

When he was gone, Rey glanced back at Finn with a mischievous grin on her face. “What are you thinking?” she asked him.

Shrugging, he tried to get her to drop it. Last thing he wanted was to get on a Jedi Master’s bad side. “Not much,” he admitted. “Well, not much of a plan, anyway. If I come up with something, I’ll tell you. The First Order is tricky to sneak into.”

“But you’ve done it before.” She beamed.

He nodded. “I’ve done it before.”

* * *

Later, once Luke was done sending out messages, the three humans marched outside and went up to the meadow on the cliffs. The rain had let up, but they had to be careful as the stone steps were still slippery.

“I thought we’d have more time,” Luke panted as he hurried. “There’s so much I wanted to cover with you.”

He had the two young people stand spread apart. Like he had asked earlier, Rey was clutching the lightsaber of Anakin Skywaker in her hands.

“Neither of you really know how to use a lightsaber,” he began. “But already, you have proven skilled with such a weapon. Instinct guided you through battle against Kylo Ren, but you are still inexperienced in technique. I can’t show you everything in a day, but we can at least cover the basics.”

Approaching Finn, he dug into the pocket of his cloak. “I realized that one lightsaber can’t be shared, but I had a solution on hand.” He pulled out another hilt and held it out to Finn, who took it carefully and inspected it.

Unlike the silver hilt Rey held in her hand, this one had a contrasting coat of silver and copper. It was rather elegant in styling… Was that pearl used as a switch?

“It was my sister’s,” Luke explained, “when she was my student.”

Finn felt his eyes widen.

“Leia was a Jedi?” Rey looked puzzled.

Her father shook his head. “No, she abandoned her training about a year in. The senate needed strong leadership and then she found out she was pregnant… Well, she felt she was needed elsewhere, with the Jedi left in my hands.” Regret passed through his eyes.

Activating the saber, a flash of blue light ignited in front of Finn. He stared at the beam for a moment, before deactivating it. “Would she want me to have this, if this is hers?”

“She hasn’t used it in thirty years,” said Luke. “And I know she wouldn’t want anyone besides you to have it.”

Once again, Finn felt touched by the kindness of a near stranger. He still kept Han’s blaster with him, a reminder of the man who knew Finn had been lying about who he was, yet never treated him with distrust or contempt, even if he poked fun at Finn a bit for that. Now, lightsaber in his hands, he wondered if he deserved a gift like this.

But he agreed it would be nice to learn more about lightsaber technique. He might have use for one later, after all.

Their master instructed them to watch him as he started with the very basic concept of stance and handling of a lightsaber. He did not have them ignite their sabers yet as he circled them and corrected their posture.

“Rey,” Luke sighed. “You’re gripping too hard. Your hand needs to be firm but relaxed. If your lightsaber flies out of your hand, you don’t want to go flying with it.”

Sighing, she loosened up. “Could we… use something—a leather loop, perhaps—to keep us from losing our weapons?”

“That’s a good way to chop off your own hand,” Finn observed.

Luke chuckled in agreement before he waved his mechanical hand to her as a reminder. “Not that I lost my hand to my own saber,” he added. “Still, an ignited saber attached to you isn’t a good idea.”

He approached Finn and nodded. “Good stance. Grip looks right too. Did they train you in close combat in the First Order?” There was no threat in Luke’s voice. It was a passive question.

“I was taught how to work with vibro-weapons, usually a riot baton.”

“Well, those aren’t quite the same, but you have the general idea down.” The Jedi Master smiled at him. “Batons need a lot more physical strength guiding them. Lightsabers, it’s about movement and technique. You don’t need a lot of power behind your attacks to be deadly.”

Finn already understood that. The red blade of Kylo’s saber nearly sliced through his shoulder like butter. He bet he could walk up to any rock on this island right now and slash it in half; the plasma doing most of the work.

The next hour saw him and Rey alternating between learning techniques and then facing each other in combat to try them out. This was trickier for Rey, who had never had a live combat partner before. She struggled to adjust, having only relied on dummies and her own imagination before. They had to be careful. Without proper practice weapons, they could seriously hurt one another. Luke watched closely, stopping them after they completed each move set at a distance from one another.

“I think this is a good place to stop,” Luke announced. “For now.”

“Will we continue another time?” Finn was hopeful. He enjoyed learning this way.

“When there is time, if that’s what you want.” The Jedi Master looked at him pointedly, but with a smile on his face.

Glancing down at the lightsaber in his hands, Finn thought for a moment to give it back before he slipped it into his pocket. The next time he saw General Organa, he would offer it to her, but for now, he didn’t see the harm in borrowing it for a little while.

From where she stood, Rey gave him a knowing grin, but he pretended not to see it.

* * *

That evening, he wandered the quiet corridors of the _Falcon._ There was so much for him to think about. 

He worried how the Resistance was faring, but since their last message, they hadn’t received any updates. Hopefully, that meant they were still holding off the First Order rather than the alternative…

The best way to stop the First Order from obliterating them was to get the _Supremacy_ to leave… Or better yet, destroy it. Finn was starting to believe his true calling was in demolition. He was proving to have a talent with planning impromptu destruction.

Stopping at the escape pod storage, he glanced at the models inside. They weren’t the roomier ones the First Order used, which could hold up to four people in each at minimum. The ones in the _Falcon,_ however, were tiny. Only able to fit one person, they were cramped as they boxed the person inside in a lying position. It wasn’t a great vessel for longer escape routes, but it had something the First Order didn’t give their pods: steering capabilities. The Order never cared to give their ‘troopers that capability, rather risking lives than risking defectors. 

He wondered how far someone could go in one of the pods.

“Going somewhere?”

Turning, he found Rey leaning against the corridor wall, watching him. Grinning, he replied, “Still time to make a dash for the Outer Rim.” 

She nodded, tiredly. “It still sounds nice,” she admitted. “But…”

“I know,” he agreed. They were needed now. Running away when the Resistance was counting on them… well, he would feel too guilty if he did.

“You can leave though,” she told him. “If you want. No one’s going to make you stay.”

Finn saw that familiar dullness in her eyes: disappointment, even though he hadn’t said anything yet.

“Actually,” he corrected, “I was just checking the pods out to see how they worked, and then I had an idea.”

“What kind of idea?” Rey pushed off the wall, straightening herself. She was interested.

He grinned. “Probably a terrible one.”

“This wouldn’t have anything to do with a certain Order, would it?” Her smile mirrored his.

“That’s _exactly_ why it’s a terrible idea.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you all liked this chapter. This one is a favorite of mine!


	21. Chapter 21

“Ugh, Finn, this place is creepy.”

Wherever it was he took them, the dark room full of silver lockers sent chills down her spine. Something was off about this room, and not just because it was on the _Supremacy._

Finn paid her no mind as he quickly got to work. He checked the side rooms, blaster in hand, for anyone that might be lurking, but must have found it was clear. Pulling open one of the drawers of the locker, Rey blanched when she saw what had been stored in there.

A body. Or maybe just armor. It looked like a dead stormtrooper in full costume. 

“Is this a morgue?” she gasped. She peeked into a nearby drawer to find yet another body stored inside. “You brought us to a morgue!”

Continuing to search through the collection of bodies, Finn left certain ones open, and closed others after he glanced at the faces under the helmets. “We need established identities if we want this to work,” he explained. “And this is the best place to get one.”

Stealing the identity of a dead person didn’t sit right with Rey, but she knew Finn was right. “Wouldn’t all these people already be reported as deceased?” she brought up.

“Not the ones still in their uniforms,” Finn explained. “I can’t tell you the full process, but the first step is for droids to remove them and then deactivate each call sign. That’ll register each person as deceased in the system.” He then stood back, a series of drawers left open. “Take your pick.”

She fidgeted as she gazed over each of the bodies left out. On Jakku, it was taboo to leave a body out for over three days. The heat of the sun sped up the decomposing process, leaving the living susceptible to contracting diseases from rotting flesh. Some people even believed the spirits of the dead wouldn’t be able to pass on without a prompt burial.

“What do they do with the bodies?” she asked.

“They’re cremated. More sanitary. There isn’t any space for a cemetery.”

That made sense. A lot of groups preferred cremation on Jakku too. Too many creatures might dig up a body later.

She looked the dead up and down, noticing the ones Finn left out had some similarities to her: skin tone, hair color, and build.

“Do you really think we can pass off as any of these people?” Rey had her doubts.

“Not until we can get an update profile photo for their call signs,” he said. “And to do that, we’ll have to lie low and keep our helmets on until we can get one.” Then he seemed to rethink his plan. “We should keep them on the whole time, actually. There’s probably wanted pics of us all over the place.”

“And if we run into anyone these people knew, they’ll know we’re impostors.”

“Yep. So, my advice is for you to keep your head down, keep the helmet on, and stay quiet. If anyone wonders why you’re not dead, say you almost died, spent time in rehabilitation, and can’t remember much because you were sent to reconditioning after.”

“What’s reconditioning?” She didn’t like the sound of that.

Finn winced. “That’s where you go if you screwed up. They… do a sort of memory wipe and try to correct the behavior problem.”

Okay, that was horrific, but at least it gave them an excuse if they got caught.

Giving each body a check over and taking each role into consideration, Rey finally pointed to a woman in a black uniform. “Who was she?”

Picking up her helmet, Finn turned it on and peered inside. “HC-2871, a fleet engineer.”

“So, she did repairs? I can do that.”

“Well, sometimes,” Finn added. “Most of the time, she would have been keeping track of what ships were coming and going, unlocking TIEs from the hangar, that sort of thing.” He appeared like he was thinking this over again. “Actually, we should just make you a mechanic. Less for you to need to learn.”

Pushing back the other drawers, she was only left with one choice. In a gray jumpsuit, a woman lay in her drawer peacefully, like she was asleep. 

“YV-8820,” Finn read off the tag hanging off her arm before he cut it off. “Mechanic. Died in battle when she inhaled toxic fumes.” He handed the tag to Rey. “Remember that call sign. It’s yours now.”

Gazing down at the body with a frown, Rey silently apologized for what she was about to do. Taking a deep breath, she propped the body upright and began to remove the woman’s clothes.

Finn was making his choice through a series of stormtrooper that sort of resembled him until he came to his decision and stripped the armor off the man.

“What will the droids think when they find the body tag and their clothes are gone?” she asked.

He shrugged. “Probably that they’re just unidentified. When a call sign goes missing in action for a while, the system will just deactivate them on its own. I checked some of the other bodies and found a few without tags or clothes.”

“Who are you now?” Rey asked as she glanced around and realized that she had no place to change in private. Suddenly, she felt very shy.

Finn, however, didn’t seem to think anything of this. “ME-6964.” He shrugged out of his shirt, leaving Rey with an eyeful of bare skin and the scar that ran down his shoulder.

Her cheeks warmed.

Noticing her state, Finn paused before he unzipped his pants. “Oh, um… guess I’m just used to getting dressed in front of everyone,” he admitted before he grinned. “We both turn around? How ‘bout that?”

Nodding, Rey almost jumped to look away from him, her heart pounding. She disrobed quickly, glad the mechanic’s uniform was easy to figure out. Sliding it on, she only had difficulty figuring out where the various buttons and zippers were.

“Are you dressed?” she asked him, after a few minutes.

“Yeah,” he answered. 

Turning around, they glanced at each other. Rey had never seen him in stormtrooper gear before, and though he was still attaching the last of the armor plates to his underclothes, he put it on like a pro. Suddenly, the reality of his background sank in. This was the only life Finn had ever known. 

Then, he went over to inspect her, to make sure nothing was out of place. “Looks good.” He held the black helmet out. “Try this on.”

She gripped the sides of the helmet with both hands and then slid it on. It felt heavy, but the fit was right. The helmet covered the sides of her head and her eyes, but the area around her mouth and nose was exposed to the air. “Is this how it’s supposed to look?

“Nod your head up and down,” he instructed, and she did what he asked. “Does it feel loose? Is it wobbling on your head at all?”

“A little.”

Reaching up, he pressed something in the back of the helmet. Instantly, Rey felt it adjust and tried shaking her head again. This time, it sat on her head firmly.

“That works.”

Finn put on his helmet and did the same. “All right,” he began. “This is it. When we step out, I want you to follow me at a distance. Remember your call sign, YV-8820, and what I told you to use as an excuse. I’m going to try to get us to one of the administrator offices to get our pictures taken and entered into the system.”

Standing next to each other, both of them heaved a heavy sigh. The moment they left this room, their mission began (if they could call it that). Luke probably figured out where they ran off to, but he didn’t know what they were planning. No one did. She knew Finn had the same doubts as her about this idea working.

“You have your comm link?” she asked, patting her pocket where hers rested. 

“Yep.”

That was her only source of comfort. In case they were separated, they at least had a way to communicate with each other. 

The door slid open in front of them. Quietly, the pair stared at one another before they took their first step out. Immediately, Rey felt too exposed. Someone was going to see right through her, she just knew it.

Finn tapped her shoulder and pointed. “This way.”

Doing as he said, she stuck close to him without trying to make it obvious that she was following him. This grew more and more difficult when they started seeing stormtroopers on patrol. She thought it meant they were coming to a more populated section of the Star Destroyer, but it could just be that everywhere had someone on patrol at any given time.

She quickly learned she was wrong. Finn led her down one last corridor before she watched him go through another set of doors. Walking through herself, she tried to keep her jaw from dropping when she saw where they led her to.

Finn wasn’t kidding when he said the _Supremacy_ was like a city. She couldn’t count how many people were walking around this hub, actually, she had never seen so many people in one place before. It didn’t seem like a spot anyone actually stopped in, but more like a highway of stormtroopers and officers getting from one place to the next, and this was where they all intersected.

Rey was glad she was focused on not loosing sight of Finn. If it weren’t for that, she might have just stopped in place and gaped at everything. He was still just ahead of her, but she kept her eyes strictly on him, afraid that if she looked away, she might mistake another stormtrooper for him.

Impressed with how Finn carried himself, she tried to mimic him. She knew he must be nervous being back in First Order territory, but he didn’t show it. Rey could only hope her facial didn’t give her away.

Quickly, he left the hub and went down another winding corridor. Rey lengthened her stride to keep up. He must know where he was going.

Then, after they passed by another patrol group, he stopped and turned around to see if she still was following. They were in front of a door. She wondered if this was the administrator’s office.

“Is this it?” she asked, keeping her voice low.

He nodded, pressing his head closer to the door and remaining silent. After a long moment, he pulled away. “I don’t hear anything inside,” he explained. “So, this is what we’re going to do: we’ll run in and check to see if the console is on. With any luck, the admin is out and forgot to log out.”

“And if it’s logged off or someone’s in there?” she inquired. Not that she could offer a better idea, she just thought this planned relied too much on luck.

Then she remembered she had a skill that could help them.

“Wait, I might be able to get someone to take the pics for us.”

Even if she couldn’t see his face, she knew he was staring straight at her, waiting for an explanation. 

“Remember what I told you about how I escaped the cell on Starkiller?” Finn nodded. “Well, what if I can use the Force to convince someone to take pics for us?”

After taking a long pause, Finn reconsidered the plan. “You know what, let’s go with that. If no one’s around and we can’t get on the console, we’ll just wait until someone comes back.”

They entered the office, finding it empty. Finn ran around to the other side of the desk in the front of the room to see the console screen.

“Blast! Logged off.” He sighed. “Okay, let’s wait outside for someone to come back.”

Quickly, they exited the office and stood back in the sterile white corridor. Only this time, they weren't alone.

“Did you get your pics taken?” a voice behind them asked.

Rey heard herself gasp as she and Finn twirled around to see a petite woman in a black wool uniform. Under her cap, sat a neat bun of sleek black hair. For someone so small and unthreatening in stature, her gaze was intimidating. 

“Uh—umm…” Finn was trying to scrap together and excuse. “We’re a little lost?”

“I’ll say you are, _traitors,”_ she rolled her eyes. “Or maybe… _Resistance scum?”_

Then, she started acting strange. A small grin broke out on her lips and she winked at them. Rey felt herself tilt her head, trying to read this woman.

She was about to try the mind trick when the woman reached to her neck and tugged at a thin piece of leather hidden under her jacket. An oblong pendant was revealed, showing intricate designs in the metalwork. 

The pendant was flipped around, showing a tiny, but unmistakable Rebellion emblem. 

Relief flooded Rey, though she wasn’t entirely sure how trustworthy this woman was. It was almost too lucky to run into a Resistance sympathizer immediately.

“Come with me,” the woman said. “We’ll get those pics updated for you.”

Doing as she asked, they were led away from the office, down another corridor. Rey gulped, wondering if this was a trap. She might have to use the mind trick if it was.

The woman took them to a dark room full of lit up consoles. Glancing around, she observed the area was empty. Not even a droid was rolling around cleaning up the floors. They were alone.

“I know you’re not First Order,” the woman began. “And by the way you acted when you saw my necklace, you must be Resistance. So, spill: who are you and why are you here.”

Finn and Rey looked at each other before Finn removed his helmet and Rey followed his lead. “We’re came here without Resistance permission,” he admitted. “They’re in trouble.”

The woman’s eyes widened when she glanced at Finn. “You—you’re Finn. _The Finn!”_

Next to her, Finn shifted uncomfortably. “Uh… yeah?”

“I heard what you did,” the woman exclaimed. “Through the Resistance, I mean. The First Order’s been trying to cover you up—Oh,” she paused, as if realizing she was ranting. “I’m Rose. Rose Tico. Undercover missions.”

She didn’t seem to know who Rey was, which, she didn’t mind. Finn continually appeared embarrassed the longer Rose spoke about him. For his sake, she tried to move the conversation along.

“We’re here to try to give the Resistance time to retreat, since the _Supremacy_ is over Crait.” Rey hoped she already understood this, considering she was on the enemy ship. 

Rose nodded her head. “Right.”

“So, we snuck on hoping we could send the First Order packing, but we need to get our photos into the system to avoid suspicion.”

After thinking about their idea for a moment, Rose finally asked, “And how, exactly, are you going to send the First Order packing?”

“Either disable the _Supremacy_ so they have to retreat—” Finn began.

“—Or just blow it up,” Rey finished.

Staring at the two of them, Rose’s eyes widened again. “Well, I’m glad I know the plan, if you’re going to blow it up. Should have checked in with the Resistance first,” she chided. “We’ve got quite a few undercover agents stationed in the First Order.”

Rey glanced at Finn nervously. They hadn’t thought about that. “Are there any other undercover workers here?” she asked.

“As far as I know, it’s just me,” Rose answered. “Which is why I haven’t been able to be much help to the Resistance. I’ve just been feeding them intel on what the First Order is planning for attack if I hear anything.” She went over to a console and powered it on. “Now, how about those pics?”

She had them stand one at a time in front of the console, instructing them to stand up straight and look directly in the camera. She had them remove their helmets again, holding them out of view of the lens.

“And no smiling,” she warned.

Finn went first, knowing exactly what to do. Studying him, Rey noted how he held his helmet under his arm during the shoot and how he kept his shoulders back. There was a dead look in his eyes. He might have been the one to come up with the plan, but Rey wondered if mentally, Finn had been prepared to put on the white armor again so soon.

Then, it was her turn. Quickly, she stood where Rose pointed to and tried to copy what Finn did.

“Chin up,” Rose instructed. She hit a button on the console. “And… done!”

Relaxing, Rey took a deep breath before she went to stand next to Finn as Rose entered in codes. They gave her the call signs they stole, hoping they were still valid.

“Where’d you get these numbers?” she asked.

“The morgue,” Finn replied, prompting a grimace from the other woman. “Are they still active?”

“Yeah,” she said, not looking away from the screen. “Pics updated.”

Rey felt relieved.

At least, until Rose warned, “You’ll have a few days before you get caught. Tops. They’ll run DNA tests on untagged bodies in the morgue.”

And there was that bad feeling again.

“Oh, we’re not planning on staying long,” said Finn concluded with a smile.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I call this chapter: Finn & Rey Commit Identity Theft.


	22. Chapter 22

In a foul mood, Kylo Ren stomped down the empty corridor towards his private hangar. His TIE Silencer was ready for him and waiting.

The Resistance was giving an amiable effort in holding out while the First Order continued to chip away at their fleet, but it was only a matter of time before they would either be drawn out of their holes or entombed in them. The mines of Crait were old and had been abandoned until recently. Unless the Resistance had gone in and done maintenance earlier, the Order predicted that a direct hit above ground at just the right spot would shatter rotted foundation beams and create a cave-in.

His footsteps echoed on the solid, unforgiving flooring, steady in their rhythm until suddenly, Ren came to a halt. 

At first, he thought he was being pulled into another warped space by the Force, but he found everything to be as it should. This was something else.

First, he sensed the scavenger. Then, the Force informed him of the presence of the traitor. They were close.

Doubting he could sense them like this far out of Crait’s atmosphere, Ren realized it must mean that they were somewhere on this mega-class Star Destroyer. But that would mean they would have snuck on without initial detection.

Reminding himself the girl knew how to influence the thoughts and actions of the weaker-minded, he wouldn’t put it past her to use the Force to sneak on to the _Supremacy._ That must be how they did it. It was a shame the girl brought the traitor along; Ren had no use for a defective stormtrooper, but he saw potential in the scavenger. Raw power flowed through her, fueled by her anger and pain. He was hoping to find an apprentice of his own, the voice that had always guided him had advised it. Their heir to the Sith should find another to uphold the Rule of Two, especially because one day, Snoke would no longer be around. Snoke was no Sith, but he had his purpose, and for Ren, that purpose was almost finished. He just needed to know the last pieces of information Snoke was holding from him, and then he would no longer have use of this master.

Speaking of which… his master hadn’t seemed to pick up on the intruders, or at least, hadn’t contacted Ren about them. The _Supremacy_ was populated with thousands of people, which might make detection more difficult, but if Ren could sense them, surely Snoke could?

If not, then he might have found his in to achieve the last of his training.

Turning around, he abandoned his mission to Crait for something far more important.

* * *

Finn and Rey knew they had to work quickly if they wanted to make this work. The _Supremacy_ was enormous, which meant the interior mechanics that kept the Star Destroyer running were far more complex than Rey was used to.

She also needed to not look suspicious and being a mechanic in the company of a stormtrooper might be. At least, she had an idea of what to do for this issue.

First, she asked Rose where she could get a toolbox to look like she had business in the engine room. Second, and she hated this part, she told Finn she needed to do this alone.

“But what if you get stopped?” he asked, worried that her lack of First Order knowledge would get her in trouble.

“I’ll just tell them they called me in for minor repairs,” it seemed like a logical thought process. She hoped if she just looked like she was supposed to be there, no one would question her. 

Rey could tell Finn didn’t like this idea, but he probably had nothing better to offer either. Sighing, he nodded his head.

“All right, but keep us posted. Any sign of trouble, you get out of there.”

Nodding, she vowed to be as safe as she could. For Finn. 

As careful as she could, she headed towards the engine room per Rose’s directions. It was on the bottom deck of the _Supremacy,_ but even with those directions, Rey knew it would be easy to get lost. She relied on turbo lifts to direct her to the right spot, waiting for an empty lift before she got on.

Just like she thought, she cut down on suspicion by carrying a toolbox and walking with purpose. No one even gave her a second glance. Now, she just needed to keep up the farce while she got herself familiar with the inner mechanics. 

Overwhelmed by the size of a mega-classs, she wasn’t sure where to begin. Figuring any point was a decent place to start, she started inspecting the parts in her line of vision, noting that to keep this Star Destroyer functioning, it needed ten times the power of a typical one.

 _Are you thinking what I’m thinking?_ the familiar voice suddenly made another appearance. It had been a while.

I don’t even know who you are, she wanted to say. She knew the voice well, but ever since Takodana, she questioned the nature of it. But if she had any idea what the voice was suggesting, it was to jump in and cause havoc, no plan required. 

The best way she knew to create an explosion in an engine room was to cause something to overheat, but to do that, she would have to think strategically. She didn’t have the ability to pin the blame on someone else by fixing the internal thermometer to read too cold so that someone else would adjust the coolant levels, but she could create a leak in pump or two. 

Making up her mind on the plan, Rey got to work quickly and then remembered she had to do something first. She dug into her pockets and retrieved her comm link.

“Finn, you there?” she whispered.

The comm link received no response for a few seconds, then crackled with static. “Rey, is everything all right?” Finn’s voice on the other end sounded worried.

“I’m fine,” she assured him. “I just wanted to tell you what I’m about to do. I’m going to leak the coolant hoses, which will overheat the engines. You and Rose need to secure an evacuation ship. When I’m done, I’ll comm you.”

There was a pause on the other end of the link. “Be safe.”

“I will,” she promised.

The comm link went silent. Taking a deep breath, Rey tried to focus on her task at hand, but she already found herself distracted by the feeling that she was being watched. Looking around, she searched for anyone that might be lurking, only to find the area deserted. 

Uneasy, she decided it was best to just get to her job and get out of there as quickly as possible. She looked down at the tools provided in the box and judged which would be best to destroy metal pumps in a Star Destroyer. None of these would have been what she would have chosen on Jakku, but she had to make do with what she was given.

Then, she noticed the blast doors surrounding each section of the engine room and noted overhead sprinklers. Her bet was, if a fire started in any of these rooms, the blast doors would shut and the sprinklers would go off to avoid spreading fire to other parts of the engine. That meant if she wanted this to work, she would have to cause leaks in multiple pumps.

Carefully, she approached the first pump and held a wrench up to the bolts, loosening the pump. It was a quick job, but she had to keep her wits about her to move through the area smoothly and without giving anyone a head’s up of what she was up to.

Once she got to the third pump, she counted her lucky stars that she might pull this off. She raised the wrench and angled it to fit over the bolt…

That sense that she was being watched overtook her again. She stopped what she was doing, a sudden urge to hide made her look around for cover. 

_He_ was here. Somewhere. That’s what she was sensing.

The lightsaber was hidden under her jacket awkwardly. She and Finn had been concerned that they would have to leave them behind in the morgue at first. Digging around for it, she clumsily pulled the hilt towards the floor, careful to not ignite it on herself.

Rey would rather not face him again when he had reinforcements all around. Glancing around, she found a small crevasse in the machinery she thought she could slip in to, but hesitated. If she was caught, she’d be trapped.

Her next instinct was to get out of there as fast as she could. Turning towards the direction of the turbolift, she decided to find a staircase instead. If the Supremacy was anything like the Star Destroyers on Jakku, there should be one close to the turbolifts. 

The moment she stepped into the corridor, she knew she was too late.

“Scavenger,” the voice of Kylo Ren was directly behind her. She swore as she turned around.

The first thing she noticed was that his helmet was damaged. Actually, it looked like it had been smashed with one spot along his cheek dented inward. She wondered if it was tight to wear and hoped if she saw him without it, there would be an enormous mark on his face to prove it.

“Now the mask really reflects your personality,” she snarled. “It’s a good look for you.”

The insult angered Ren enough to make him growl as he ignited his lightsaber. “You’re coming with me,” he commanded. 

She ran her thumb against the switch of the lightsaber in her hands. “Not on your life.”

Their blades met, sparks flying as plasma beams hit against the other. As Rey backed up, she came dangerously close to a hot pipe and dodged out of the way just in time. This was a terrible location for a fight. If they hit machinery on accident, they could kill themselves with poison gas, extreme heat, or an (unintentional) explosion.

Ren seemed to understand this too, but his rage prevented him from trying to move away. He went right for her. That meant, Rey had to be the one to keep her head and try to lead him away from the engine rooms. 

Dodging a slashed aimed for her leg, she moved to the side, parrying his next stab and moving back towards the corridor. She kept moving, trying to avoid becoming trapped in the narrow walkways. 

Jumping away again when Ren lunged for her, she narrowly escaped a stream of hot steam that leaked from a slash his saber made in a pipe. Ren, however, was not so quick. The steam hit his leg, and though the material of his pants seemed sturdy and higher quality, it did not protect him from the intense burning he was experiencing. 

He yowled and crumpled, his lightsaber fell forgotten to the floor. Rey saw her chance. She reached her hand out to call his weapon to her, effectively removing it from Ren’s use. While he was down, she took off running, hoping she would lose him.

Then, she felt herself freeze up, her legs failing her as she tumbled forward. She heard Ren stumble towards her. 

“You’re not running away again,” he told her as he picked up both lightsabers. “Not this time.”

He grabbed her by the collar of her jacket, his strength allowing him to lift her upper half off the floor. Fear flooded her. 

Forced to stand, Rey found that in Ren’s grasp, she could not break away. She tried concentrating on the Force for help, wondering if maybe she could counter Ren’s hold on her. Closing her eyes, she tried to reach for what she felt on Ahch-To, hoping it would give her the strength to break free.

Instead, she felt cold metal around her hands. Somewhere, Ren had a pair of binders on him and just cuffed Rey’s hands in front of her. 

“Stand up,” he growled. 

She scrambled to her feet, glaring at him. Clearing her thoughts, she could not allow Ren to know what she had been up to.

He looked her up and down. “The Supreme Leader has been expecting you,” he said, leering.

* * *

Something wasn't right.

Well, a lot of things weren't, but as he stood in the dark room with only a few consoles and their various lights to brighten his sight, a new anxiety swept over him.

It had been a while since he’d last heard from Rey. Keeping watch while Rose was doing… whatever she was doing on the console, he reached into his pocket for his comm link and debated trying to reach Rey. He worried if he tried to, he might give her away when she was in the middle of something important or around other people.

“How much longer?” he asked Rose. The longer they lingered, the more likely they would get caught.

Without tearing her eyes from the console screen, she answered, “Soon. I’ve been intending to do this for weeks.” She was downloading something to a datastick but wouldn’t elaborate. 

Finn figeted impatiently. He kept imagining stormtroopers were just outside the doors. Even a technician just happening on them would be the end of this.

A few more minutes passed before Rose removed a datastick from the console. “Well, it’s not as much as I was hoping to get, but if we’re abandoning ship, this is better than nothing.”

“What is it?”

Rose grinned proudly. “About a sixth of the database profiles on every personnel in the First Order.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rey is in big trouble now!
> 
> See you next update!


	23. Chapter 23

In the turbo lift, the two adversaries were silent as they stared straight ahead at the door. With her lightsaber taken for her and the cuffs over her wrists, Rey had no means to escape from Kylo except wits and luck.

Even if he hadn’t told her prior, she would have known she was taking her to his master. Snoke was a mysterious figure to her and not knowing what she was about to encounter made her more fearful. This was the man who turned Ben Solo to the dark side behind her father’s back.

"My father told me the day I was taken from him I was in the care of his older students," she broke the silence to get his attention. "Unless I am mistaken, you would have been there too." She allowed accusation to lace her voice.

He did not look at her when he answered. "I know what you're thinking. While your disappearance benefited me, I had nothing to do with it."

The confession surprised her, and though she didn't entirely believe he was telling the truth, there was a strange sincerity to his voice. Her memories of her life before Jakku were almost non existent, but in the last few days, she thought she could recall a boy with fair skin and black hair whom she had doted on and teetered after. She would never forgive Kylo Ren for killing his father, but perhaps she could use guilt and familiarity to her advantage.

"Cousin," she tried, "it does not have to be like this. There is another way."

"Do not call me that," Ren growled. "I am not your _cousin._ There is no shared blood between us."

The lift came to a halt. Rey felt herself gulp as the doors slid open, revealing an enormous, spacious room with metallic walls and obsidian floors. There wasn’t much to this room, little in decoration and very few occupants. Along the walls sat glass displays of ancient artifacts—what they were, Rey wasn’t sure, but they had a dark aura about them. In the very back of the room, centered so it was the first thing anyone’s line-of-sight saw, was a black throne. As dark as it was, it was hard to see in the light, let alone distinguish any detail that might have been carved into it. 

There was also someone sitting on it.

Rey assumed this was Snoke, though he was not what she had imagined. For one, he wasn’t human like the rest of the First Order. He was certainly a humanoid, resembling a human to some extent, but she could tell even from her distance away that he was far taller than a human naturally could be. Tall and pale was about the best she could describe him. Ancient was probably better. He seemed almost decrepit, so frail that the wind could carry him away. His skin was aged with wrinkles and his face was disfigured with scars in some spots. A large gash on his hairless head was hard to miss. He looked like he’d seen many battles in his undoubted long lifetime but whatever strength had carried through those times could not be seen now.

Ren shoved her forward. “Move it.”

She stumbled, forced deeper into the room. The man on the throne chuckled as he watched.

“Well done, my apprentice,” he crooned. “My faith in you is restored.” His gaze drifted to the woman in front of him. “Young Rey,” he gazed at her pointedly. “Welcome.” Then, he glanced back at Ren. “Where is the other?”

“The Knights are searching for him as we speak,” Ren answered. “And if I may take my leave, Supreme Leader, I would like to join them.”

“You may go,” Snoke dismissed his apprentice. “When you return, we’ll talk about your training.” Then he paused. “The lightsaber…”

Ren stood up a little straighter. The praise seemed to be exactly what he was looking for. Holding out his hand, he showed Snoke the lightsaber he took from Rey, who then summoned it to him with the Force. 

"Thank you, master.” Ren bowed slightly, before he turned away and went back to the turbo lift.

The room was silent for the minute it took Ren to leave. Rey took the time to gaze around once more, hoping for a chance to escape. Instead, she glimpsed another obstacle. The things she believed were statues, unnaturally still in red, glistening armor, were alive. Guards, she guessed. Just another thing between her and getting back to Finn.

Snoke waved his hand through the air in a fluid motion, catching her attention. Her binders unlocked with a _click,_ freeing her as she massaged her wrists. 

“Come closer, child,” he said.

At first, she refused his order and stood defiantly where she was. Snoke lost his patience quickly. He reached out with the Force and tried to pull her in, cackling when he found her trying to fight back. To assert his power over her, he tugged again with more strength behind him.

_“Closer,_ I said.”

She tried to resist again, but Snoke was no longer testing her limits. From her midsection, she was yanked forward, floating in the air as she sped right to the foot of the throne. When he released her, she stumbled to the floor, landing on her knees. 

“So much strength,” Snoke chuckled. 

_He’s going to give you an offer,_ her mysterious voice told her. _Only take it if you have no other opportunity to escape. Hopefully, Finn is coming up with something._

Rey didn’t even know if Finn was aware she had been captured, but the voice spoke sense. What was important right now was that she survived. If she had no choice but to accept whatever Snoke would offer her, she would do it and try to find a way to get away from him later. She just hoped Ren wouldn’t find Finn. There was far more at stake for a defect stormtrooper than a scavenger from Jakku.

“Darkness rises, and light to meet it,” Snoke said. “I warned my apprentice that as he grew stronger, an adversary would appear. It is the will of the Force.”

He gazed at the Skywalker lightsaber like he was studying a work of art. “Skywalker,” he mumbled as he sat the hilt down on the arm of the throne. “Such a disappointment.”

“You underestimate him,” she warned, wondering how much he knew and if he was reading her mind right now. Her head didn’t hurt, so he wasn’t invading like Ren had back on Starkiller.

As he studied Rey, Snoke has a gleam of amusement in his eye. “Oh? Do you know something I don’t?” 

With horror, she realized he knew everything already. She must have shown it on her face, because he was grinning almost skeletal-like. 

“Young fool,” Snoke said. “You think I don’t know who you are? The child Skywalker took in out of the goodness of his heart. Heir to the Empire.” He chuckled, “Yes, I know all about _that_ too.” He studied her again, like he was trying to see into her innermost thoughts, even her soul. “I admit, when you went missing, I believed that was the last the galaxy would ever see of you. A mistake I’ll never make again.”

Rey's heart and mind seized with panic. She needed to get out of here. As she tried to stand up, however, she found that Snoke still had a hold on her. 

“I will give you a choice, girl,” Snoke growled. “Tell me where Skywalker is, and I will let you live, as my apprentice. Refuse, and I will take that information from you anyway, then kill you.”

“No!” she gasped.

He raised his hand and with the Force, tossed her across the room. Her cheek hit the cold floor, but couldn’t even move her arm to try to soothe her skin. 

Upon impact, she felt herself being pulled away into some strange space where time slowed. 

_“I can help you,”_ the voice of Kylo Ren filled her head. _“It doesn’t have to end like this. The dark side… it calls to you. My use for Snoke is at its end, but you… You and I… We could rule the galaxy together.”_

And part of her desperately wanted to take his help, but that would just lead to other problems. She didn’t know what to do.

_Just hold on a little longer, Rey,_ the voice of her imaginary father encouraged her. 

The world sped up again. Searing pain filled her skull, her brain throbbing. Snoke broke into her mind and dug through her mind. When she tried to resist, he just gripped with the Force tighter, jiggling her around like the rag doll she left back on Jakku.

She wasn’t sure how long she could take this. As she thrashed and screamed, she looked for any opportunity to escape. There were only two options she could see: choose an offer, or die. And though the pain was worse than anything she'd ever experienced, Rey did not want to die.

It was almost like she could feel Snoke sorting through her mind, carefully pushing thoughts around. She tried to hide her father’s location, imagined him on D’Qar instead. At least the Resistance wasn’t there anymore. She could give that location and everyone would still be safe.

Was he the one who taught Ren this trick? He must have; Rey could not imagine her father or anyone with good intentions to practice something so violating. Where Ren had hesitated, Snoke was unrelenting. She was unable to fight back this time.

Her own memories appeared in front of her in brief intervals. A sunset on Jakku. The gray sea of Ahch-To. Her pilot doll, loving crafted with a child’s hands. 

_Don’t show him,_ the voice encouraged.

Snoke paused in his search. “What was that?” he asked, though not to her.

With his grasp on her mind looser, she took this moment to clear her mind. Wipe it to a blank state. 

Then, she found herself back on the floor, writhing in pain.

Snoke laughed. “Are you trying to fight me, Rey?”

Desperate, she extended her arm in front of her, trying to call the lightsaber sitting next to Snoke to her. It twitched on the throne, then flew into the air towards her open hand.

“Such spunk,” he commented with a grin. “Very well, then. If it’s a fight you want…” 

Snapping his fingers, he summoned someone from a room behind the throne. At first, Rey expected she would see another guard in red armor emerge. Instead, it was a man in black armor (at least, Rey thought it was a man). He wore a mask that reminded her of Ren, only this one resembled the skull of a human. 

But unlike Ren, he did not carry a lightsaber. Instead, he carried what looked like an axe, the blade a beam of red plasma, crackling dangerously. 

“My Knights of Ren have been hand-picked by myself to be trained in the dark side. They are the most formidable warriors in the galaxy,” Snoke boasted.

She had not been aware that Snoke had more apprentices than Kylo. It worried her that the man she saw as her principal adversary might not be the most powerful apprentice in the First Order. She wasn’t even sure how many there were. 

This one approached her, axe raised. Bracing herself, Rey ignited the lightsaber and held it up to block the incoming attack. 

The strength behind the axe almost knocked her back. She stumbled, her arm faltering. Regarding this man, she tried to spot a potential weakness, only to find nothing standing out to the eye. Whatever vulnerability he had that she could exploit, she would have to figure it out by testing his abilities and hoping he wouldn’t kill her first.

Rey moved out of the way just in time to dodge his next strike. She tried to take a stab at his leg, but he used his axe to block her attacks. 

This time, she tried something different. Perhaps, with a little push with the Force, she could knock him over…

Except, no, he was a Force-user too. As she lifted her hand to push, he knew exactly what she was up to and did the same to her first. She felt herself stumble to the ground, suddenly the one with the disadvantage. 

Before she could try to defend herself, she glimpsed, almost in slow-motion, the axe fall upon her. Rey braced herself and tried to move away, knowing she wouldn’t be able to get away without some injury befalling her.

The world around her began to shake. 

Pausing his attack, the Knight seemed just as confused as she was. The rumbling grew stronger, shaking the room and knocking over one of the display cases near Snoke.

Then, the wall to their right erupted into flames.

Snoke shouted something, but Rey couldn’t hear him over the crackle of the fire. She saw her chance as the Knight momentarily glanced up at the hole in the wall where the eruption began. Lightsaber aimed, first she stabbed him in the thigh, and then right in the chest as he fell to the ground.

Rey didn’t wait around to see what killing the Knight would bring. As Snoke was yelling orders to his guards, she darted for the turbolift and didn’t dare to look back as fire consumed the throne room.


	24. Chapter 24

As much as he wanted to shout for Rey, he knew that the engine deck was too dangerous of a place to do that. If the wrong person overheard him, it could mean capture.

Not to mention, someone was already aware they were there.

 _"I know you're near,"_ the voice of Kylo Ren flooded his mind. _"Show me where."_

Finn ignored him and kept walking. He had more pressing matters to attend to and Ren was not to be trusted. Maybe if he kept ignoring him, he'd go away.

But Ren was persistent. _"I will find you,"_ he taunted. _"But if you tell me your location, I promise you'll live to see another day. I can make that happen."_

 _How annoying,_ his guiding voice intoned. _We'll have to figure out a way for you to block him out._

Finn hoped that would be sooner, rather than later. This weird connection was more of a nuisance than anything else and it put the Resistance in danger. There had to be a way to sever it. He didn't want to be bonded to Kylo Ren forever.

He and Rose stuck close to each other as they searched. They found evidence of Rey’s presence with her abandoned toolbox, but no sign of the person they were looking for. 

“She was here,” Rose emphasized as she inspected a pipe. “These bolts are loose.”

“Then where is she now?” Finn asked.

That was the most important question. Wherever Rey was, it wasn’t here. And if she wasn’t here, that meant she was probably in trouble. 

Rose grabbed the toolbox and carried it out of the space, into another engine section. She loosened bolts the same way Rey had. “If we want the effect we planned, we need a lot more leaks.”

For the next ten minutes, Finn kept watch while Rose worked. She loosened the bolts even more than Rey had. Liquid leaked from the pipes, falling to the floor in slow, rhythmic drips.

“There,” Rose finished. “Now that’ll trigger overheating much quicker.”

“Now what?” Finn asked.

“Now, we find Rey and get out of here.”

That seemed as good an idea as any. Now, if only they had an idea where Rey was. He was worried she’d been captured again, and he would have to make another rescue attempt. They were short on time if the engines were due to overheat. 

According to his helmet screen, intruders had been detected too. They were probably being tracked down as they stood there. The best thing to do would be to get away from the scene of the crime and distance themselves from each other. 

They hurried back to the staircase. If they got away from here quickly, maybe they had a chance of escaping undetected—

“Well, well,” a voice said behind them. Finn felt himself wince as he froze. He knew that voice. “What do we have here?”

He dreaded to turn around, already knowing who was there. Still, he’d rather see what he was up against—blaster count, at least—to figure out if he had a way out. 

The gleaming armor of Captain Phasma looked right back at him. Since he knew there was no use trying to dissuade her, Finn felt himself smirk under his helmet. He would have never had the guts to do this back when he was with the Order.

“I see you got out of the trash compactor,” he snarked.

Her gaze targeted him. “FN-2187,” she said, flatly. “So good to have you back.”

Behind her, a group of stormtroopers stood, blaster raised. They waited for her command. Finn glanced at Rose and saw fear on her face. She had been undercover for so long, and then he and Rey had to show up and blow that for her.

The lightsaber still sat in one of the pouches of his utility belt. He wished he had got it out before they were caught. If he tried to reach for it now, he’d likely get shot.

No, if he wanted to survive, he would have to wait and find the right opportunity. 

"We have a special punishment for traitors,” Phasma mused. He waited for her to announce _public execution._ “Glad the helmet still fits you, FN-2187. We have a special program in reconditioning for soldiers like you.” Then, she scanned Rose up and down. “RJ-2017, is it? A year of training wasted on a Resistance spy, I see. Well, no matter. We can find you a spot in reconditioning too.”

Finn felt his fears materialize in front of him. The First Order wasn’t going to kill him, they were going to force him back into their ranks. No matter how far he got, he would never escape the Order and they would never let him go.

They were herded upstairs, down a corridor and into a hangar. Finn knew the layout well enough: they would cut across, to another lift, which would take them directly to the wing of the reconditioning program. If he wanted to get out of this, they had to think of something, and soon.

“Phasma,” a voice called out. Finn knew this voice too. “What do you got here?” 

A tall, lean man with bright red hair approached them. Though Finn had never met General Hux before, the man was unmistakable. He led every rally to inspire the troops, his voice booming in microphones as he cried for victory. That same voice echoed down corridors through intercoms during regular announcements that decreed the superiority of the First Order.

“Two traitors.” He could hear the smugness in Phasma’s voice. 

Hux glanced Finn and Rose over before he reached over for Finn. The stormtroopers surrounding them gripped his arms so he couldn’t move as the general removed the helmet over Finn’s head and glanced at the face underneath.

“Well, well.” He grinned. “FN-2187. Back for your old job?”

“He will be once reconditioning is done with him,” Phasma agreed.

“Great job, Phasma!”

While the general and captain were conversing, Finn saw his chance. The stormtroopers were watching their superiors with close observation, hanging on Hux and Phasma’s every word. They did not want to seem disrespectful. It gave him time to fiddle carefully with his utility belt, sliding out the hilt of Leia’s old lightsaber.

The stormtrooper on his right didn’t see the plasma beam ignite until it was too late. Finn ran him through with the lightsaber and grabbed for Rose the moment their captors’ attention was on their fallen comrade. They had about a second before blasters were drawn to get to cover.

He was glad they were in a less-populated hangar. They were already outnumbered as it was. Finn was no fool though. Any moment, Hux would call in reinforcements. When that happened, they were as good as dead.

They jumped behind a pile of cargo boxes for cover. “Are you a Jedi?” Rose gaped as the blaster fire rang overhead.

“Not even close,” Finn replied. He looked around the hangar for a potential escape route. “Spot us an escape craft, if you can. We’ll try to make a run for it.” As much as he didn’t want to leave Rey behind, he wasn’t sure what more they could do.

“We’re gonna get killed trying that!”

“Better than going to reconditioning!”

Blaster bolts missed them overhead. From the other side of the crates, they heard Phasma bark orders to her men. A minute later, as they were continuing to move to different areas for cover, they heard something ignite and crackle.

The chrome helmet appeared over them, an electrified riot baton in her hands. “I know you don’t really know how to use that,” she nodded at the lightsaber. “Lay down your weapon and I won’t kill you.” 

“And go to reconditioning? No thanks,” he replied, raising the lightsaber. He saw Rose take cover farther away, eyeing them from around a corner. Finn knew he could buy her time to secure an escape craft, but she needed to be quick. Even with his training in combat, he knew he couldn’t beat Phasma. She had been the one to teach him everything he knew and likely had a few tricks up her armor.

She didn’t even give him a change to brace himself before she swung at him. Barely having time to block her, Finn raised the saber directly in front of him to stop her line of attack. The weapons crackled as they met.

“Do you think yourself a Jedi?” she taunted. “That you’re special? All you will ever be is just a bug in the system that the Order will crush.”

Finn swing wildly at her. She blocked him this time and with her brute strength, pushed forward. Sidestepping her, Finn ducked away from her next attack.

Behind them, the corridor to the hangar rumbled before it burst into flames. Knowing that Phasma hadn’t time to report Rose’s sabotage yet, no one had probably gotten to the engines in time before they overheated. That meant they had limited time to escape before the fire consumed them.

With a growl, she jabbed and slashed the vibro baton at his neck, chest and legs, which he parried or dodged as best he could as he looked for an opening. Their armor would provide some protection from electrical sparks, but if either were directly hit, their weapons would slice through.

The problem was, she was stronger and faster than him. If she had a weakness, he couldn’t find it, let alone take advantage of it. He lost track of Rose, but he hoped she was somewhere safe and the stormtroopers hadn’t found her. The rest left Finn to Phasma. She must have given them orders not to interfere.

Phasma was no longer aiming to take him to reconditioning. Her stance and attacks intended to kill. All Finn could do was try to outmaneuver her and try to get a lucky hit in as she pushed him back towards the wall behind him.

From an entrance to his right, Rey sprinted into the fray, her hair stuck to her face and her arm bloody. A moment later, two men in black armor with red plasma weapons appeared behind her. 

She spotted Finn, her eyes widening. He saw her mouth open, but if she yelled anything, he couldn’t hear her.

He was trapped and as he tried to block Phasma with the lightsaber once more before she split his skull open. Instinct was on autopilot now. He found his other hand drifted out in front of him.

As if the floor were ripped out from under her feet, Phasma fell backward just as another explosion erupted in the hangar. 

“Finn!” 

Spinning around, he saw Rose wave at him from behind a reconnaissance starfighter. If that was what she had selected, he hoped it was ready to go. He glanced at Rey quickly before sprinting towards Rose.

He hopped into the ship, Rey arriving just seconds after him, panting. She hit the switch to shut the door behind her. “Go!” she shouted. “Go!”

Rose was already three steps ahead of her in the pilot’s seat. The starfighter rumbled as it moved forward and pick up speed. “I could use a gunner in the back… and a co-pilot if anyone knows how to fly.”

Even though they were both exhausted, Finn and Rey went to where they were needed most. He jumped into the gunner chair and strapped himself in, realizing the mechanics were the same as the TIE fighter he had escaped in with Poe just days before.

Out of the entry of the hangar, Kylo Ren emerged, lightsaber ignited and ready to strike. Finn felt himself smirk. _"You're too late,"_ he taunted. "Too slow. Where's that pride of yours now?"

 _Your confidence is misplaced,_ Ren replied. _Wherever you go, I will find you._ It reminded Finn of the current task at hand. They had to find a safe place to escape to. 

“Where are were gonna go?” he yelled to them. “If someone follows us, we can’t take them back to Luke!”

“Crait, then!” Rose decided. “They already know the Resistance is there!”

“Wasn’t the point of this mission to drive the First Order _away_ from Crait?” Rey asked. As he glanced her way, he noticed she didn’t look good. Whatever she ran into on the _Supremacy,_ it was lucky she got away.

Looking back at the mega-class Star Destroyer, he saw the hangar they just left engulfed in flames. If anyone was going to follow them, it wasn’t going to be out of that hangar. They were being given a slight head start. Likely, the First Order would be called to regroup as the _Supremacy_ evacuated. This would be a heavy loss for them.

Hopefully, this would be enough to give the Resistance the opening they needed to escape.

Rose pushed on towards the white-covered world in their viewport, not knowing what they would face when they arrived.

"How'd you get into the Resistance anyway, Rose?" Rey asked out of her own curiosity.

Finn glanced behind him, seeing her take a moment to dig out the necklace hidden under her shirt and grasp it tightly in her hand like she was saying a prayer. There was a haunted look in her dark brown eyes.

"The First Order destroyed my home. I joined the Resistance to avenge my family. Because of them, I'm all alone."

Then, Finn and Rey heard a story detailed by Rose. One of loss and rebellion, of a family who risked everything to give their daughters a chance for freedom, and of a sister who died a hero.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm posting this as I turn off the debate. The constant ramble from a certain someone is actually giving me a headache.


	25. Chapter 25

With Rose’s piloting and Rey’s eyes, the starfighter slipped into the atmosphere of Crait far away from any lingering First Order warship. They knew as long as they kept a low profile, no one would think anything of a reconnaissance starfighter. Once they touched down on the world, they could come up with their next plan.

And they hoped once they got there, they could help their friends.

No one knew how the Resistance was faring. The last they heard, the First Order was picking them off, and they were desperate for help. Being undercover, Rose rarely got updates on their status. 

They only hoped they weren’t too late.

The chance that Kylo Ren would follow them was great. Whatever bond he shared with Finn and Rey, it was something he could use to his advantage. Neither was sure how the connection worked, but if he could peer in to see what they were doing, he might be able to figure out how to see where they were too. His experience in the Force made him more likely to be the first person to uncover this ability.

As the drew closer to the white salt-covered ground of the planet, they began to see more of how the Resistance and the First Order had been facing off. What looked like narrow lines from above turned out to be trenches dug out around what must be where the Resistance was hiding. 

A lone ski speeder hovered over the surface, like it was on patrol. Rey gripped the bottom frame of her seat, her eyes wide.

“We have to let them know we’re not a threat.” 

Drawing out her commlink, Rose started at it for a moment before clicking it on. “Agent Tico to base. Tico to base. Come in. Over.”

Nervously, they waited for a response. In the meantime, Rey scanned the horizon for a safe place to land that wouldn’t be seen as a threat to the Resistance if they didn’t answer.

The comm crackled. “This is Commander Dameron to Agent Tico. State your business. Over.”

“Poe!” Finn exclaimed from the gunner’s chair. “I’m so glad to hear your voice.”

There was a pause for a moment from the other line. “Captain, Finn and Rey are with me,” Rose explained. “That’s what I wanted to report. We’re in a First Order reconnaissance starfighter and just on the outskirts of the base.”

“I’m so glad you two are okay,” Poe sighed. “We’ve been worried sick when Luke called us and told us you disappeared… A reconnaissance starfighter, you say?”

Rose gave him a quick summary of what happened, ending with the explosions in the _Supremacy_ and where they were now. 

“I’ll put out the message and give you clearance to land,” Poe told them. “Be careful, though. There’s other First Order ships flying around.”

A grin slowly spread on her face. “Oh, we have a nasty surprise for them if they get in our way.”

It only took a few minutes of flying towards their destination for them to deploy her fury. A TIE zoomed overhead, not paying them any mind as it flew towards where it intended. Rose followed it, slowly gaining altitude, before she turned to Finn.

“You know what to do when we get in range, right?” she asked. When he nodded, she looked pleased and continued to ascend.

Once they were above the TIE, she accelerated and began to lower the starfighter so they were directly in front of their enemy. In the gunner’s seat, Finn aimed and then fired on the TIE. The direct hit shot off one of its wings, causing the body of it to spin out of control as it fell to the ground.

Rose flew them closer to the ground, towards what Finn assumed to be the base. He wasn’t sure what purpose Crait served before the Resistance arrived, but the enormous metallic domed structure couldn’t have been made by a private army with tight purse strings. Upon landing, he braced himself for the impact as they touched down and slowed to a halt outside.

A small welcoming party was waiting for them, comprising of Poe Dameron and General Organa. This would be the first time Poe and Rey met properly, come to think of it. While Poe looked excited to see them, Finn blanched at the frown on the general’s face. Judging by Rey’s hesitance to approach, she saw this too.

They knew they couldn’t stand there forever, though. Dragging their legs forward, the pair, followed by Rose, took their time getting to their new hosts.

“You two have a lot of explaining to do,” Leia growled when they were in earshot.

Finn winced this time. “We… blew up the _Supremacy?”_ he tried.

To give Leia credit, she tried to remain stern over looking impressed, but a twitch of her eyebrow gave her away. “Blew it up?”

“Well, it was on fire when we left it.”

Poe couldn’t help a grin that spread over his face. “That’s great to hear!”

“You two put yourselves in danger,” Leia reprimanded. “And didn’t tell anyone where you were going.”

“I’m sorry,” Finn tried to appease her. Back in the Order, even an apology wouldn’t matter much. He expected her to announce a punishment any moment.

She rubbed at her forehead and sighed. “You’re not going to go unpunished,” she told them, “but we don’t have time right now. And we’ve noticed some of their TIEs being called off in the last hour, so you must have been effective.”

Finn saw a smile twitch on Rey’s lips this time. “Where do you need us?” she asked. “I can contact my father and tell him we’re safe.”

“Oh, that won’t be necessary,” Leia said, though her sudden gaze at Rey turned affectionate. “He’s on his way now.”

Visibly grimacing, Rey never looked so mortified. Even Poe looked like he felt sorry for her and jumped in to try to find a compromise.

"You guys look like you could use a meal," he suggested. "Or a cup of caf." That grin on his face was still there. "And I wouldn't mind hearing what you all got up to in the First Order."

"Don't be too nice to them, Commander," Leia warned, though even Finn could tell she was half-joking.

As Poe, Rose, and Rey entered the base, Finn found himself staying behind. He stared at General Organa for a moment, his hand going to his utility belt and fidgeting as he debated what to do. Briefly, he was glad he left Poe's old flight jacket on the _Millennium Falcon_ before he left, since the clothes he was wearing only hours ago were still in the morgue on the burning _Supremacy._

Leia seemed to understand he wanted to talk with her and waited patiently. He removed the lightsaber from his belt and held it out to her. "I believe this is yours, ma'am.

Turning the hilt in her hands, she studied it in both shock and awe. "It's been a long time since I've seen this," she commented.

"Luke was holding on to it," Finn explained.

She nodded. "I thought he might. My brother always held nostalgia close to his heart."

"He let me use it for training, but it was yours, so I wanted to return it to you." It would be hard to be without a lightsaber for a while, but he was sure he could make do. It just didn't feel right to keep something that didn't belong to him.

With a smile, Leia handed it back to him. "I am not a Jedi," she reminded him. "I chose a different path. If my brother gave it to you, he wanted you to have it and I agree with him. This saber needs a home and I could think of no one better."

Finn felt his mouth gape at her before he forced it closed. "Thank you, General. I don't know what to say."

"Though I wouldn't mind if you let me borrow it sometime," she suggested. "Sometimes, Luke needs a little reminder of who's the boss. Sibling rivalry, you see?"

"Just promise not to murder him." Finn winced.

With a laugh, Leia shook her head. "Oh, I would never kill him. Maim him within an inch of his life, perhaps, but never kill him. He still has to make up for all the years of grief he caused me."

* * *

Flying the _Falcon_ after all these years was like peering back into beloved memories. If Luke imagined hard enough, any moment Han would enter the cockpit and yell at him to get into the passenger’s seat—this was _his_ ship. 

But just as quickly as the joy and nostalgia came, if faded and replaced itself with regret. Luke hadn’t seen Han in over five years and that chance would never come back. He would have liked to think himself as good a pilot as Han, but the truth was, there was no other pilot in the galaxy who was smart enough to make the Kessel Run in twelve parsecs. All Luke could hope was that the Force would guide him through this and wherever Han was now, Luke would make him proud.

The white crust of Crait was almost blinding to stare at. He placed his focus on darker objects to avoid his vision from becoming blurry. Luckily, the First Order had a preference for black.

A group of TIEs appeared out of the sunlight, swooping in overhead. Chewbacca growled a warning.

“I see them!”

He wouldn’t be able to outrun all of them, but if he got them in sight, they could have a chance at shooting them down. “Chewie, can you cover the gunner’s chair?”

His wookiee co-pilot nodded and stood up, sprinting to his new task. This would be hard without a co-pilot, but the _Falcon_ was under-staffed. 

Gripping the controls, he slowed the freighter down, allowing the TIEs to fly past them. He picked up speed again, knowing once the TIEs slowed and turned to fly at them, Chewbacca would have his shot.

Like a flock of birds, the starfighters arced and backtracked. They approached the _Falcon_ again, firing at them. The shields would keep them safe for now, but if they were hit too much, those would eventually fail.

“Ready?”

When the TIEs were in range, Chewbacca unleashed blasts of red upon them. 

The first to be struck lost a wing and spiraled downward. The second erupted into a ball of fire. Without shields, these starfighters went down as easily as the Empire’s older models from his youth. He thought perhaps by now they would have given them better defenses, but once an Imperial, always an Imperial, he guessed.

“Great shot, Chewie!” he praised, but just as he felt like he was three decades younger and in a different war, something pulled him back to the present. 

In view, a First Order command shuttle descended, its wings folding upward as it drew closer to the ground. The ramp lowered, and Kylo Ren stepped out onto the cracked salt surface, scanning the area.

“Can you cover me up here?” Luke called out.

* * *

Looking back and forth around the white earth, Kylo Ren began to wonder if he was imagining things. He came here looking for his uncle’s wayward scavenger, only to sense his uncle here. There was no sign of Skywalker though.

“General Hux,” he barked back into the shuttle, “scan the area for any ships.”

“No need for that,” a voice came behind him. 

Ren turned, his face no longer hidden by his helmet. Rage flared in his eyes. “Old man,” he called out. “Do you think you can save my soul? Is that why you’re here?”

“No.”

Waiting to see if Skywalker would say anything more, they regarded each other in silence. Ren thought his uncle would have tried to appeal to him the same way his father had, but it seemed he had grown wiser since they last met.

Quickly, he grew impatient. He unclipped his lightsaber from his belt. The plasma blade crackled and hummed as salt from the ground kicked up and burned when it touched the red beam.

A flash of green appeared in his sight. He prepared himself as Skywalker walked forward, lightsaber in hand and a frown on his face. Each adjusted their stances as they sized the other up. The dark side may favor Ren, but his uncle had far more years of experience with the Force.

“I can help but wonder if perhaps part of you wants me to be here to offer you help,” Skywalker taunted. “Since you were the one to bring it up.”

“I’m sure you’re hoping for that,” Ren growled. “You want to find weakness in me. You won’t find such a thing within me now. The dark side has given me the strength that you could never provide.”

He waited again to see if his former master would reply this time. Perhaps, instead, he would find himself dodging a sudden attack. Skywalker knew his old weakness and might try to use them. If he did, he would be surprised to find that where Ben Solo had been weak, Kylo Ren was strong.

Instead, he saw his uncle arch a thick eyebrow but not move to strike.

“You still don’t understand what true strength is.” Skywalker shook his head, his eyes gazing off to the distance. “I thought I taught you better than that, Ben.”

Heat rose within Ren, uncontrolled and shaking. He aimed his blade at his uncle. “And I suppose your _chosen one_ knows this?” He wanted to laugh.

“What chosen one?” his former masker asked. Ren could almost feel the confusion in him.

Stepping backwards when Skywalker came closer, Ren continued to point his blade in front of him. “The girl you decided you wanted more than me. The girl you lost and who made you forget about your first apprentice.”

He remembered the little girl in his uncle’s arms, how she always took up most of his attention. As small as she was, she needed the utmost of care. Ren recalled a time where he was practicing his form, only to be interrupted by her crying. His master apologetically stopped their training for a few minutes to feed her, but it only made Ren grow impatient. Surely, his uncle knew how important it was to train the next generation of Jedi, yet he allowed himself to be distracted by something as commonplace as a family. 

As the girl grew, Ren began to wonder if his uncle took her in simply because she already showed so much promise in the Force. Perhaps he saw more than just a child needing a home. When she wanted a toy that was out of her reach, she would focus her efforts on it and float it to herself, her abilities allowing her more independence than a toddler normally would experience. Even Skywalker noted that in all his studies, in all his travels, he had never met a child as gifted as the one in his care. He would say this with a smile, like he was proud that he could give someone so strong the name Skywalker.

Nevertheless, Ren only found her to become more of an annoyance once she started walking. She would follow him around, watching him with big, childish eyes and try to copy what he did. He always had to be extra careful to make sure she wasn’t trailing in his shadow as he train, lest he hurt her on accident. Certainly back then, the child brought a sort of tenderness out of him, as children often do. Ren would have never hurt a hair on her head, even out of spite. But what remained true was that as long as she held his uncle’s utmost attention, her presence held Ren back.

The night an assassin snuck into the academy and stole her away was a blessing for him. His uncle had been away for a few days, joining a family friend on a search for his own missing children. Ren sensed the intruder and followed that feeling, only for a voice to halt him in his steps.

_Let them go,_ it whispered. It was the first time he heard this voice in his head. _The girl has a great destiny ahead of her. Keeping her here would only hold her back._

Instead of following after them like his instinct would have first led him, Ren did nothing to stop the assassin from taking her. He had a destiny too; he knew how terrible it would be to keep the girl from hers. Really, he was doing her a favor.

Her disappearance might have disrupted his uncle’s life, but for Ren, he found it to be a breath of fresh air. When he wasn’t out looking for her, Skywalker would put more effort into his apprentice’s training, even bringing in new students of an adequate age for Ren to practice with. Finally, he was feeling like he was becoming a proper warrior in the Force, challenged and learning to push his boundaries. His uncle was finally no nonsense about the future of the Jedi too. Each day, he would train his students to a strict schedule, then retreat into his home for the rest of the night, doing his own research on the Force and current events in the galaxy. A couple of times a year, he would announce a temporary departure, only to return days later and go back to the same routine. Ren knew he’d been out looking for the little girl who’d gone missing, but wherever she was, if she was even still alive, she was well-hidden. 

It was in his uncle’s absence that his other guiding voice whispered to him. Ren was great, but he could be so much better. He wanted that, and so, when the voice talked to him, he never tried to shut it out.

Choosing the dark side was the best choice he ever made.

Taken aback, Skywalker actually laughed. “You mean my daughter? Oh, Ben, I knew you were jealous of her, but this is just… An adoption doesn’t mean a preference. I loved you both.”

"But now she’s back, and you placed all your faith in her.” Ren kicked salt up from where he stood, like an animal ready to charge. “After I destroy you, I will kill her and all your work, the future of the Jedi, will die with her.”

Shaking his head, Skywalker did what Ren would have never expected. He turned off his lightsaber. 

“And that is where you are wrong.” He grinned, conspiracy brewing underneath. “Strike me down, and I’ll become more powerful than you’ll ever imagine. The Jedi will not end with us, there will always be someone who will take up the call of the light.” That smile was so wide now, that Ren wanted nothing more than to slash it off his face. 

“Besides, there is another now,” he concluded. “I believe you’ve met before.”

Pausing, Ren only needed a moment to realize who Skywalker was talking about. The traitor, FN-2187, was that other person. Instead of the rightful choice of an established family, a random stormtrooper defector had been taken in to be trained as a Jedi, probably just to spite Ren. 

No longer having need for Skywalker’s antics, Ren poised his saber to cut his uncle down, only to pause mid-strike. He hadn’t sensed it before, but now he did. The Force was strong here, but it wasn’t the usual signature he recalled Skywalker to possess. It was weaker.

Ren growled. “More tricks?”

That smirk remained. “See you around, kid.”

And like a ghost, the Jedi Master vanished into thin air.

Staring at the spot where his uncle was just standing, Ren felt blinding anger overtake him. He slashed at the air, growling. This was all a trick of the Jedi, and he fell for it.

“Sir,” an office called out from the shuttle’s ramp. Ren detected hesitation from him, which was wise. He wasn’t sure if he could control his blade at the moment. The next annoyance might find it lodged in their chest.

“What?” he snarled.

The office paused, like he was debating on saying anything more. Then, he seemed to realize that staying silent would just push Ren’s anger further. “We’ve received a message addressed to you. From the Resistance.”

He stomped into the shuttle, wondering if those fools were finally going to surrender. That would make coming out to this backwater world worth it, at least. There were no signs of the scavenger or the traitor.

Inside, the technicians, the pilots, and the officers got out of his way as he approached a console. Hunching in front of it, he opened a message and ran an encryption code to made it legible. 

A projector flickered next to him. Before the image appeared, he glared at everyone in the shuttle, staring at them. _“Get out,”_ he warned them.

Everyone fled, just as he wanted. He turned back to the projection and allowed it to play.

The image of a young woman, tired but carrying on despite the war, hovered in front of him. Even with the blue tint of the holographic, he knew the exact shade the hair in those two small buns were. Knew the exact shade of brown her eyes held.

_“Brother,”_ she began. _“I wanted to tell you this face to face, but I know if we ever meet again, it will not be as friends, but as enemies. I had hopes that you would return to us, but ever since our father didn’t return from Starkiller, I’ve realized I was naïve to believe that._

_“Our dad… How could you? He loved us so much. He would have done anything for you. We all would have…”_

He rolled his eyes. “Don’t tell me,” he said over the recording. “Another person trying to use the bonds of _family_ to make me regret everything. Make me change my mind.” It had been years since he saw his sister, but before he took up the mantel of Kylo Ren, she had been the one person he felt truly close to. Even with their age gap, they told each other everything. Well, almost. His fear of his family’s reaction to his longing for the dark side kept him from telling her his deepest secrets.

Kaydel was not Force-sensitive, not a candidate to join her brother at their uncle’s choice of a site for an academy, so the siblings kept in touch with holo recordings. Kay was six years old when she started to send them, clumsy in her words but encouraged by their parents to keep making them so she and her brother would form a bond. As Ben Solo, he didn’t mind replying to her messages, in fact, sometimes, he looked forward to them. 

As much as he hated to admit it, sometimes he missed her.

_“This will be the last time I try to contact you,”_ his sister’s message continued. _“Ben, you’ve broken my heart. Mom’s too. Even if you tried to return, you will be charged with the murder of countless innocents. There’s blood on your hands.”_

It once crossed his mind to ask Kaydel to join him. With her talent with tech, the First Order would have found good use of her. Too bad she was like their mother: stubborn and unmoving in their choices. There was blood on that woman’s hands too, in case they forgot.

_“Goodbye, broth—”_

He turned the recording off before it finished, not giving Kaydel even that victory over him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're getting close to the end of this section! I hope you've been enjoying it.


	26. Chapter 26

Leia waited in the makeshift Operations center, keeping her eye out for any opening she could see. With Rey and Finn’s arrival, they brought hope that the First Order would thin out after being recalled to help with the _Supremacy’s_ evacuation efforts. From what their scans were picking up, this was exactly what was happening. Leia thanked her lucky stars. Those kids were crazy, but it seemed the Force really was on their side.

She had the Resistance on alert to load up on their remaining transports to flee Crait the moment they saw a clearing. However, she would remain on the base until the last transport was getting ready to leave. Leia would not leave anyone behind.

Hunched over a console, she kept her watch on the radars, watching the movements of their enemies. If she saw any sign of reinforcements, she would tell the evacuating Resistance immediately.

“There are pockets where the First Order’s lines are thin.” She turned around to see the bearded, aged face of her brother.

“Luke, you’re here.”

He nodded. “I ran into your son on the way in.” There was a frown on his face, making his wrinkles around his mouth more pronounced. Giving his figure a better look over, Leia noticed how tired he was. There was a slight hunch to his figure to give away his exhaustion. “Threw him in for a loop while Chewie snuck in.”

“I hope you gave him what he deserved,” she commented. Then, she had another thought. “Or was the effort too much for you?”

“Had I been farther away, it would have killed me,” her brother admitted.

The Force had always been strong with Luke, but even he had his limits. Leia hoped he didn’t do anything foolish, in case he needed his strength later. There were two young Force-users who needed him now, and though she had some training as a Jedi decades before, Leia knew she was not the right person to teach them. They needed Luke.

She gazed back at the radar. Another First Order ship, represented by a large dot, vanished from the area. 

“I think it’s time,” she observed. “The ships are ready and we have another place scouted out that’s safe.” Standing up, she brushed off her gray dress.

“Where are Rey and Finn?” Luke asked. “And Kaydel?”

“On board already, along with an old friend.” She smiled.

* * *

After all the stories he’d heard about General Calrissian from the First Order, the man in front of him didn’t seem to match the description he mentally imagined. Not because he was older either, that was expected, being thirty years since the Galactic Civil War. No, the man currently sitting in the cockpit and chatting to the three young adults around him, was bewildering.

And the very first thing he heard out of the general’s mouth was a dirty joke, followed by a tale of how he swindled a ship and recruited its owner into the Resistance at the same time. The group in the shuttle hung on his every word. The way he wove a story together was almost poetic.

Rey was staring at him, wide-eyed and in awe. She probably heard stories of Calrissian growing up, just not the same stories that Finn heard.

Calrissian was overjoyed when he learned Rey was indeed Luke’s long-lost daughter and had embraced her tightly upon meeting her. He knew her when she was a baby and mourned her loss as a member of Luke’s family. To learn she was still alive after all this time felt like a miracle to him.

He was particularly interested in Finn though, and hearing about his escape from the First Order. It sounded like Poe had already relayed much of the escape to him, but he wanted to hear it from Finn’s own words. After hearing the tale again, he said it renewed his hope in finding the children the First Order had stolen for decades, an effort Calrissian himself had led.

As he transitioned into yet another tale, the shuttle got a notice to prepare for departure. Luke and Leia weren’t on board, but Finn learned it was protocol to not have the leaders of the Resistance on the same ships at any given time, in case one was shot down. 

Moving into the cockpit, Calrissian began to get ready for takeoff. Rey jumped in to help him, in case he needed a copilot.

Finn got situated on a nearby seat and buckled in while he waited. The shuttle shook slightly as it rose into the air, then calmed while they zipped away. Lando used the internal intercoms to warn everyone about the jump to lightspeed, and Finn braced himself as the shuttle rattled again.

He wondered if they had to make detours to avoid detection from the First Order or if they were just being extra cautious, but it seemed to take longer than usual for the all-clear to be given for everyone to be safe to walk around the shuttle again.

When Finn was able to return to the cockpit again, he found Rose had beat him there. She was waving the datastick she had taken from the Supremacy excitedly. A smile was on General Calrissian’s face.

“It’s not the whole database though,” Rose concluded, apologetically. “I didn’t have time to do a full download before we had to leave.”

“That’s still more than we’ve been able to uncover in years, Agent,” Calrissian praised. “Be proud of that achievement.”

“What’s in it?” Finn butted in, curious.

“I downloaded some records from the First Order’s systems. On their stormtroopers. It’s not much, but I might have at least an eighth of them.”

“You mean…?” His eyes flicked over to Rey, who smiled warmly at him.

Rose nodded. “If I was lucky, I might have gotten your record, Finn.”

He felt himself suck in a breath. Never had he thought he’d ever get the chance to see the records kept on stormtroopers. He wasn’t even sure what was included in them. But he held a little hope that maybe…

“Maybe I’ll finally know what happened to my little boy and girl too,” Calrissian added. Finn felt his eyes snap up to the older man.

“You—?”

“Over two decades ago, I had children. My oldest was a boy and my youngest a girl. Had a wife too, if you can believe that.” Calrissian had a faraway look in his eyes as he stared out at the streaks of light that made up their path. “One night, the First Order showed up in Bespin, but we didn’t know who they were at the time. Took us all by surprise. They took our kids. Vengeance for the Empire, I believe. My son had just turned four, my little girl barely two.” 

“Why didn’t you go to the Senate?” Rey asked. “Surely Leia—”

“—She tried,” Calrissian responded. “When we went unheard, that was when we realized there might have been Imperial sympathizers within the Senate. Leia was just one person and though many listened to her, few took action. Some were afraid of getting into another war, others probably had other allegiances. After she tried to rally the politicians and failed, we knew we were on our own. We had no evidence to accuse individuals. All we had were missing children. To the Senate, the kidnappings could have been by anyone. Slavers, they preferred to blame.”

There was pain in his voice. So much pain. 

“So, we searched on our own. Han, Luke, Leia, and I. Each time, we came to a dead end. Eventually, it became too much for my wife and I and we separated. We both want our kids back, of course, but being together just reminded us of how much losing them hurt.”

Finn wondered if he ever met the general’s children back in the Order, ever passed them, faceless and anonymous underneath the white helmets. It was true, some recruits joined on their own accord, but the majority came from homes they were snatched from as children. Most didn’t remember where they came from.

“I hope you find them, General,” he said, honestly.

There was a softness in the other man’s eyes. “I hope we find your family too.” Then, like an afterthought, he added. “And call me Lando. Never liked the formalities.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, one more chapter before this section is over. I'm about 1/4 through of the _Rise of Skywalker_ portion as of today. See you this weekend!


	27. Chapter 27

No one told Supreme Leader Snoke what had happened on Crait. Some feared the wrath of the Supreme Leader, others were smart enough not to get on the wrong side of Kylo Ren’s blade. Few would know how to explain what they witnessed anyway.

Though the overall trip to the Resistance-occupied world was a failure, the way Ren handled the breech on the _Supremacy._ The girl, Rey, might have escaped along with the traitor FN-2187 and a Resistance spy, but had Ren not found them, there had been a potential for more information to be stolen and handed over to the enemy.

Snoke summoned his apprentice hours after he arrived on the _Finalizer,_ the temporary headquarters for the First Order. Kneeling in front of the durasteel chair turned into a throne, Ren waited to hear what his master had to say.

“Your actions have pleased me, apprentice.” A grotesque smile spread on Snoke’s face. “You did not fall to the tricks of the light. My faith in you has been restored.”

“Your praise honors me, Supreme Leader,” Ren said. 

“There have been some failings, of course,” Snoke continued. “We have lost the Resistance, but we will quickly correct that. But you, Ren, I think it’s time for the final step of your training. I know you’ve been waiting for this moment for a long time.”

Indeed, he had. And here he was, finally. Ren felt himself gulp and hoped his master didn’t see it. A sign of fear was sign of weakness.

“As we speak, we’re approaching a world in the unknown regions,” Snoke explained. “It has no proper name; in the Empire’s records, all it was ever called was site L31.”

Ren had never heard of it, though there were many worlds in unexplored space he’d never heard of, so that wasn’t surprising. During its heyday, the Empire sent expeditions to these worlds to map and scout resources and life forms. It was a potential to expand their territorial hold, but sadly, never came to fruition. 

“The Emperor hid a vault of his treasures on this world. And there, you will complete your training.”

Ren felt disappointed in this knowledge. He thought the completion of his training would feel more… ceremonial. Instead, it sounded like he was being sent on another errand by his master. He was done being just an apprentice.

“What is it I’m seeking?” he asked.

Snoke grinned. “When you see it, you’ll know.”

“And if I find it, I’ll know all I need to know?”

“You will know the true power of the dark side and what the future holds,” Snoke confirmed.

Under his mask, he smiled. This was all he needed. The elderly Supreme Leader taught him well, but now, it was time for the heir of the Sith to take his rightful place. He had no need for an ailing, weak master.

_He has fulfilled his role,_ the voice of his true master hissed. _It is time for you to claim your destiny. Do not hesitate._

He stood. “Thank you for passing your wisdom to me, Supreme Leader.” He bowed slightly, his head bobbing. “I believe this means our relationship has come to its end. You understand, I’m sure.” Igniting his lightsaber, he made his approach.

Slitting his eyes, Snoke growled, "You think you are stronger than me? Such a fool." Holding out his hand, a crackle of electricity erupted from his fingertips before a full branch of blue lightning reached out and struck Kylo.

But he had experienced this sort of punishment before. Many times, in fact. Kylo was learning how to tolerate the pain, though he knew too much of a shock to his heart could kill him. He would have to be careful.

When the next shock came his way, he was ready. He braced himself for the initial impact before focusing on the Force. It allowed him to focus the electrical stream through his person, leaving him unharmed as he redirected it towards the floor.

This was his chance. The moments between Snoke's attacks were critical. He would not let them go to waste.

There was a flash of uncertainty in Snoke’s eyes, but it was too late. He had no time to counter Ren’s attack before his throat closed on itself and choked. 

His body seized and shook as it tried to fight against the grip to breathe. In a little over a minute, his struggling ceased before he went slack in Ren’s grip through the Force. 

Lowering his hand, Ren took a deep breath and stared at his dead master. He had imagined this moment for years, but he never knew what a triumph like this would feel like. Freeing himself of his helmet, he breathed the cool air of the Star Destroyer directly into his lungs. A smile stretched across his lips.

There was much he needed to do. The more pressing tasks on his mind were to deal with the Knights of Ren. They had betrayed him by following Snoke's orders over his own, the leader they originally swore allegiance to; they would be punished for that. Reminded who they answered to. There was also the matter of the death of Ap'lek. The scavenger girl killed him in their fight on the _Supremacy._ She was far more competent a fighter than Kylo had original believed and that was something the First Order needed to account for.

He called for General Hux first, not putting a halt to the trip. There was so much he needed to do, and he couldn’t wait to put his first plans into motion. 

The general marched in, his uniform pressed perfectly and his cap situated on the center of his head. No doubt he expected his summons to be from Snoke. He was in for a surprise.

As soon as he saw Snoke’s slack body leaning on the chair of the throne, Hux blanched and halted mid-step.

“What—?”

Ren stood in front of him. “The Supreme Leader has unfortunately passed.”

“We will have to inform the whole chain of command,” Hux began. “Call for the process to select a new—”

“That won’t be necessary,” Ren cut him off. “The Supreme Leader made it clear that I’m to be his successor, being his apprentice.”

“But we must go through the—” 

He paused, mid-sentence, eyes widening. Smirking, Ren watched as Hux lifted his hands to his throat, choking just the same as Snoke had. He wouldn’t meet the same fate, though. He had every intention to allow the general to keep his life, as long as he behaved, of course.

Hux took a deep breath when Ren’s hold on him loosened. Now, he knew exactly how Snoke fell.

“The Supreme Leader made it clear who was to take his place when he was gone,” Ren insisted. 

Panting, Hux gulped. Like he was debating what to do for a moment, he came to a reluctant acceptance and nodded.

“Long live the Supreme Leader.”

* * *

World L31 was a harsh one. Covered in a thick crust of ice, the planet had very little in the way of natural landmarks besides frozen cliffs and glaciers. Intense storms of wind and ice regularly beat against its surface, meaning that very little could thrive here. 

Underneath the surface though was a different story.

Ren sensed the vault before he found it. Whatever was in it, a dark energy radiated from underneath the ice, like a beacon for anyone with a hold on the dark side to follow. The closer he got, the stronger it became, until it almost overwhelmed him.

Pausing, he looked down at the frozen ground and scraped his boot against it. As the ice piled away, he found the top of a metallic structure built into the cliff. He searched for a way inside, only to find there was nothing to open it with.

No, the Emperor would not have made it so easy for someone without the right qualifications to get in. 

He concentrated on the dark side and focused his efforts on the metal underneath him. Waiting, he kept his sight on the darkness until he felt a soft rumble under him.

What he was standing on was a lift. Carefully, he positioned himself over where he knew the metal on the surface was and steadied himself so he wouldn’t slide on ice. The rumbling gradually grew stronger; it seemed the lift was overworking itself after years of disuse. 

The slow descent brought him deep into the world’s crust. However, whatever the purpose this vault held for the Empire, it was built to last. The air around him warmed as he went lower and lower, though he still could see nothing in the darkness. He wondered how far down the lift would take him.

Finally, streaks of red light illuminated his vision. The lift left the tunnel and emerged into an expanded cavern, dark except for the dim red lighting mounted from the walls. 

From wall to wall, a collection of various artifacts ranging from grandiose furnishings to ancient technology was left in piles, unsorted and, as far as Ren could observe, unorganized. He wondered how anyone could find anything here, if they were seeking one thing in particular.

Snoke had told him he would know what he was looking for when he saw it, and Ren could only trust that his master hadn’t been lying to him then. 

The lift halted on the ground and he stepped down carefully. He wouldn’t put it past the Emperor to booby-trap the place, though he wasn’t sure he saw the need to on a world this remote and unrecognized. 

He began his search, scanning the room and its contents, though he touched nothing. As a child, he’d heard stories of caves like this, full of treasure and riches aimed at tempting an intruder away from the real prize. Touch anything but that prize, and fall victim to a cave-in or a magical curse. Ren did not believe in magic, but he believed in the worst of any scenario: death.

Finally, his sight stopped on a round pedestal in the middle of the room. It almost looked more like an altar than a display. Allowing intuition to carry him forward, Ren spotted five pyramids, framed with brass metalwork.

Holocrons.

Ren had never seen one in person, but he had heard of these mysterious tools which held messages used by Jedi and Sith alike. He wondered if they still worked and if there was any trick of getting them to play what recording they held.

The one to his near left called to him. Carefully, he picked it up and studied it.

Like a flowering bud, the sides of the pyramid unfolded, revealing a holo projector inside. It began on its own accord.

A flickering image of the dead greeted him, a withering face under a hooded cloak.

_“It is time.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... this chapter seems to have published itself. I haven’t touched the fic since yesterday, and now I’m seeing the final chapter for the section is up somehow...
> 
> Well, this is the final chapter for a while. I am currently working on the final section and I hope to start posting before the end of the year. Please bookmark this fix if you wish to be notified when there is a new update.
> 
> Thanks to all my readers and see you soon!


	28. Prelude

Anger and fear hung in the air.

The shuttle rattled as it descended lower into the storm wracked atmosphere of Kef Bir. Sitting quietly on the seats in the loading bay, a squadron of stormtroopers awaited their next orders. 

“Stay seated for landing,” a mechanical voice said over the comms.

The stormtroopers looked to one in their number for further direction. She waited a moment before nodding once. 

It was time.

Holding their blasters close, the squad readied themselves. This was not a normal endeavor. Everything their training had taught them brought them to this point, though this was exactly what they had been trained against. Failure would mean punishment, execution.

There was another shaky rumble as the shuttle touched the ground. The stormtroopers stood, ready.

The ramp descended. Waiting outside, on grassy, open fields, was their captain. He stood, angrily, as his soldiers lined up in neat fashion, just as the First Order trained them. Surely, Captain Phasma would find them formidable. Once, he would have thought them to be the best the Order had to offer. Their latest mission proved him wrong. This stop on their way back to the Order was going to be his way to right what had gone wrong. 

Then he noticed their stances, their drawn blasters. “What are—?”

He had no time to finish his question before they fired on him.

“You have a choice,” their leader told them. “Either allow us control of this shuttle or we shoot.”

“But this—” the pilot was taken aback. “Where are the other troops? I thought—?” He looked at the leader of the wayward stormtroopers. “Those orders you gave me to come here, they were fake, weren’t they?”

She didn’t answer him. That was all he needed to know.

The crew glanced at one another before the pilot spoke up again. “The First Order doesn’t tolerate traitors,” he spat. “You’ll be caught. And when you do, you’ll know which side was the right one.”

He was taken outside by two stormtoopers. There was a brief moment of silence, followed by a single shot from a blaster which echoed in the air.

The stormtroopers returned and waited. Everyone looked to the co-pilot for her answer.

“To be honest,” she began, “I’d rather keep my life.”

The leader of this revolt approached her. “We’ll have to search you,” she explained to the co-pilot. “Better not be hiding anything.”

Raising her hands, the co-pilot nodded. “Just don’t shake me up too much.” She winked.

After patting her down and searching her pockets, the stormtrooper leader nodded. “She’s clear,” she announced. Then she gazed at the technician. “And you?”

“The same as her,” he replied.

Another soldier patted him down and cleared him. He joined the co-pilot as they waited for the turncoat stromtroopers to decide what to do next. 

“Can you take us a little father from this spot?” their leader asked. “I’d rather not be in the same area, if the Order comes looking.”

They nodded and turned around in their seats. “I doubt they will but... Tell us when everyone is in and we’ll take off again.”

She walked outside and looked at the troops coming to terms with their new freedom. For a moment, she took the time to appreciate the sight, especially when one of them removed their helmets and sat it down in the grass to be forgotten. 

There was blood on their hands. Too many had died under the crushing fist of the First Order. Even if they had disagreed with their orders, it still didn’t change the fact that they had been trained to kill. 

The stormtroopers didn’t give him even a moment’s glance before they marched back into the shuttle. A small group went straight into the cockpit, while the rest waited as backup. The pilot and the small crew froze when they saw blasters aimed at them.

But not anymore. When the rest of her squad fired on the innocent, she and a few in her rank could not. Later, a few of those who hadn’t refused felt the guilt weighing them down. They didn’t want to do this anymore.

So they planned. It was a messy idea and there was a lot of doubt it would work, but this small group of stormtroopers had so far defied the First Order and were successful. They weren’t out of the woods yet, but she doubted anyone cared about a squad of defectors enough to go looking for them. Some officer would likely die for failing to rein them in, but TZ-1719 couldn’t bring herself to care about that.

“We’re leaving,” she announced to the troops. “Load up.”

The ramps rose once everyone was inside again. The co-pilot, now sitting in the pilot’s seat, began the engines again.

TZ-1719 sat behind them to monitor things. She removed her helmet and breathed in the cool shuttle air, running her hand through her sweat-soaked cropped hair before setting the helmet down on the floor. 

She would never wear it again. Never answer to her call sign again. Already, she had a new name picked out for herself, one she had once heard while on a village patrol and decided she liked it. For months, she had secretly called herself the name, deep in the far corners of her mind, to remind herself the First Order didn’t own her soul.

From now on, she would call herself _Jannah._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Merry Christmas! Have a prelude to the next section.
> 
> I confess, I went through a bit of writer's block with a chapter of this rewrite. After nearly two months of hacking at it, I think I've finally worked through the issue. It will be a while until the final section is complete though. On top on fanfiction, I am now submitting my own original short stories to publications while I do some final edits on my novel before querying to agents.
> 
> If I have a long period of time between now and the next section, I may have special chapter updates where I just go ahead and post a chapter of the rewrite. 
> 
> May 2021 be a better year for us all!


	29. Chapter 29

“All right, ready?”

In unison, two lightsabers were switched on, the humming of their blue plasma beams echoing through the jungle. The light reflected off the skin of their wielders, two young humans training in the ways of the Jedi. Under the watchful eye of Jedi Master Luke Skywalker, his pupils learned of the Force, of combat, and of meditation. For now, they were safe and hidden along with the Resistance, though finding that security took some time after Crait and their search brought them to Ajan Kloss.

“Finn,” Skywalker began. “You’ll go first. When you throw, concentrate on pulling the lightsaber back to you a few seconds after.”

His pupil nodded and held his lightsaber in front of him. Then, he pulled his arm back and swung, letting go of the lightsaber so it flew through the air while spinning.

“Now concentrate!” 

Holding his hand out, Finn squinted, focusing. The lightsaber arced in midair and circled back to him. He had to move his arm out to catch it, but either than that, he was successful. 

“We’ll have to work on your aim, but good attempt,” Skywalker praised. He looked at his daughter. “Now you, Rey.”

She took a step forward, an eager grin on her face. Doing the same as Finn, she tossed her lightsaber in front of her and focused her efforts on bringing it back into her hand.

But it was coming back too fast for anyone’s comfort. Finn yelled out, “Duck!” Everyone ran for it, just at the lightsaber whizzed past them and hit a thick tree trunk before falling to the ground. 

She heard a chuckle in her head. _Always a little too wild. Poor Finn always has to stay on his toes around you._

Glancing at her friend, she felt guilt when she saw how bewildered he looked. A lot had happened to them in the last year, and Rey sometimes wondered how Finn could just keep going the way he did. There was so much on both their plates. So many people in the galaxy had put all their hopes on them, the last Jedi, though they were barely even padwans as it was.

Sometimes, it felt too much for Rey. She would stay awake at night fearing her own failure. The galaxy told stories of the Jedi; she had grown up hearing legends of Luke Skywalker far before she knew he was her father. They always illustrated him as more myth than man, a force of power and wisdom no human could ever possibly attain. How would the galaxy remember her if she was to fail its expectations? Would they call her the girl from Jakku who had so much potential but never lived up to it? Likely, unless she really messed up, she wouldn’t be remembered at all.

_That’s not always a bad thing,_ her guiding voice told her. She was so used to its presence and found it to be more encouraging than malevolent, so she didn’t mind it so much anymore. _Sometimes, being remembered for the terrors you’ve caused is a greater curse than fading from memory. This is what happens to most people after those who knew them have passed on. It’s a reality of life._

There were many people she knew who wanted to be special. People who looked at her with envy for her role and the importance others had placed on her. She would have gladly traded places with them. To be special was tiring with little time to rest. She wondered when her thirst for adventure and exploring waned. On Jakku, she wanted nothing more than to leave the desert behind and search the galaxy for her parents, seeing the wonders it offered on her journey. Now, there were days where she wished she could go back to her sandy AT-AT and lounge in her hammock.

People like Ben Solo wanted to be special, and that longing turned them into monsters. As far as Rey had been concerned, he had been special from birth, with parents who loved him and an uncle who looked out for him. He had the Force too and was the first of a new generation of Jedi.

But that hadn’t been enough for him and now, he was the Supreme Leader of an organization threatening the freedom and future of a galaxy. Rey wondered if he was satisfied finally. If not, how much farther did he intend to go? She couldn’t imagine how much farther into the dark side he could fall.

_There is no limit to the dark side,_ the voice warned her. _Just as the light has none._

He was still looking for them. Her meditations and trainings with her father were teaching her how to close up the connection she and Finn had with Ren, one Luke suspected was forged from their earliest days as children. Still, she heard Ren call to her, ask her to show her where they were. Each time, she refused to answer him, but she always feared she would slip up. At night, she and Finn scourged the old Jedi texts for more information about what bonded the three of them, desperate for a way to severe the bond from Ren, but they found nothing. 

Finn’s voice interrupted her thoughts. “Lan— _Dad_ was hoping you and I could eat lunch with him today. Are you busy after this?”

It was still hard to believe that after years of not knowing his family, his father ended up being right in front of him. Over twenty years ago, Lando had a wife and two children, but the First Order showed up to Cloud City and took all the children who lived there. Lando never gave up hope that he would see his kids again, but each time he found a new lead back to them, he would hit a dead end. Even Luke tried to find them.

While Finn struggled to call General Calrissian _father,_ Rey could still see the awe in his eyes each time they spoke. He had yet to meet his mother, but the Resistance was trying to keep a low profile for now and so Lando hadn’t felt like it was the right time to contact her.

Still, Rey couldn’t be happier for Finn. He never said it out loud, but she knew he’d always had hoped to find his family and feared he would learn they were dead or never find them at all.

And he had a sister. Somewhere. They didn’t know where she was yet, but they kept hoping that as Rose scoured the records she stole off the _Supremacy,_ they would find her. Knowing Finn’s old callsign made everything easy. There was even a note on his famous parentage to confirm everything. Rose had only collected a small portion of the First Order’s records, but everyone kept their hopes that one day, she would find a similar note on another soldier’s profile.

In between fighting a war, father and son were trying to get to know each other, just as Rey was trying to bond with her own father. At times, there were strains in time and beliefs. Other times, there was sadness and anger. Parents blamed themselves for not looking harder while children mourned a childhood they never had.

Luke released them for lunch, telling them they would resume training a little later. They all had other duties to attend to. Finn now worked in Operations alongside Leia and Kaydel (a cousin Rey was happy to get to know) while Rey was tasked with fixing up things around base and recycling parts as best she could. Scavenging, it turned out, was a superb skill to have for a credit-pushing army.

They found Lando waiting for them outside the makeshift hangars, a small bag of presumably food in his hands. 

“I have something I wanna show you.” He beamed before looking around. “No Luke?”

“He said he had to talk to Leia about something,” Rey explained.

Lando shrugged. “Guess I’ll have to find him later, then.” He dug out a datapad before turning it on to project a holo pic. Then, he turned it around to show it to Finn and Rey. “I didn’t forget I had this, it just slipped my mind. Look! It’s the two of you when you were babies.”

The pair blinked at each other before taking a closer look.

Luke was in the pic, holding a baby girl in his arms to support her. She had a big pink bow in her wispy hair, her eyes large as she looked at the little boy sitting across from her. His cheeks were chubby and round and made his serious, intent expression as he studied the baby even funnier. In his hand was a chunky toy X-wing, bright orange and made to not be a choking hazard.

“You mean,” Finn began, “Rey and I met before Jakku?”

“Only once,” explained Lando. “Luke had hoped our children would grow up as friends. This was taken two weeks after Luke adopted you, Rey. Four weeks before Finn was taken.”

That soured the mood a little. The First Order had taken away everyone’s chance at happiness. Finn could have had a loving home, raised with his family, his sister. She could have lived with her father, happily adopted, and a student of the next generation of Jedi. Maybe even, she and Finn could have been childhood friends. 

Instead, they were plagued by memories of darkness and hopelessness. Finn could not escape war and terror, fearing the First Order would catch up to him again. The next time he came face to face with them, he might find himself reclaimed, taken for brainwashing and broken beyond repair.

Rey learned she was not immune to the pull of the darkness either. It called to her, beckoned her. She wished it would leave her alone.

At night, she dreamed of the dark side. A voice called to her, sinister and cold. She saw images of a steely and gray world, a throne of metal that reached out to her. It promised her power, all she ever wanted. All she had to do was seek it out.

She wondered if Finn ever felt the same pull. Did the darkness call to him like it did her? Sometimes, she felt like she was all alone with her own inner demons. If she told her father, would he be disappointed in her? 

As much as she wanted to tell him, Rey hated to think of the sadness she might see on his face. He’d already lost his nephew to the dark side, how would he feel if he knew it sought to take his daughter too?

“I can’t imagine what you two are going through,” Lando sighed. “Even when I joined the Rebellion, I was a lot older than you are now. You were kind of thrusted into this.”

Finn snorted. “That’s one way to put it.”

“We worry about you kids—Luke, Leia, and I—we know how difficult it can be.”

Rey felt touched that they would be so concerned for them. She might have thought they would see it as the next generation picking up the role as the hope for the galaxy, as they had decades ago. Luke and Leia had been about the same age as her when they found themselves in the center of the Galactic Civil War.

After lunch, she and Finn wandered into the jungle. They were quiet at first, enjoying the sunlight, the mossy scent of the land, and each other’s company. 

“I was thinking about what Lando said,” he began. “About our role in the Resistance. In the galaxy.”

“And what do you think?” Rey asked.

“Sometimes, thinking of ourselves as the last hope of the galaxy is too heavy a burden,” he admitted. “And I have to wonder: why us? Why, out of all the people out there, do we have to take on such destiny?”

She understood. There were days where she wanted to run away from her destiny, maybe take Finn with her. They were already in the Outer Rim, but there were plenty of other worlds they could flee to. 

“But,” he continued, “if this is my destiny, then I couldn’t have found a better person to share that with.” The smile he shot at her was contagious and bright. “You were my first friend, Rey.”

The image of the holo pic, them as two new lives in a strange and dangerous galaxy, burned into her memory. It really seemed that the Force, destiny, or whatever she should call it, wanted them together. If she had Finn by her side, Rey knew she wasn’t alone.

Reaching out, she touched his arm, right near the bend of his elbow. 

“You were mine too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I'm stuck in quarantine thanks to my dumb workplace and decided to take a four-day weekend so I could wait on my test result in peace. Problem is, I'm stuck in one room and a bathroom because my dad doesn't want me anywhere near him and he's annoying me almost more than my coworkers with his paranoia. So, to distract myself, I decided to post another chapter in between ballet barre workouts and Pokemon marathons.
> 
> I finally got through the part that had me stuck in writer's block for nearly two months. Hopefully, once I finish the chapter, I can really blow through the rest of the writing part.


	30. Chapter 30

“Is this all you found?”

Rotating a red kyber crystal in his hands, the Supreme Leader looked bored as he sat on his throne. Next to him, a small table of artifacts gleamed in the light. Even with his face hidden under his helmet, reforged and lined with red streaks to fill in the cracks, his stance told the small crew of stormtroopers he was not pleased.

“The vault we found was small, Supreme Leader,” the captain explained. “After examination, we concluded someone must have broken in and cleaned it out long before we discovered it. All we have brought you was what was left.”

Kylo Ren paused, thinking. Then he waved his hand to dismiss the unit. 

The doors of the throne room _wooshed_ closed, leaving him alone. He picked up a chalice and sat it in his lap, studying it.

He allowed it to roll off his lap, hitting the floor with a _clank_ as he sighed heavily. None of this was what he was looking for. Nearly a year of searching and nothing to come out of it. He was so sure after finding the holocron he would find something more. Something to help him revive the Sith. That was his destiny, right? He had already surpassed his grandfather in accomplishments, helming the First Order as he brought it to rule over the galaxy. Logically, the next step was to resurrect the Sith, an order of power that would continue to rule the First Order long after his life had ended.

After the holocron, he thought he needed to find more artifacts to lead him to the right place. The voice of his master had been silent lately, only offering the orders _find me._

Once he heard the voice of the Emperor who he thought was nothing more than a ghost of the past, he knew who had been watching him all this time. He knew what he needed to do to revive the Sith, but he needed direction of where to go. 

There could only be one master, and it was time for Sidious’s reign to truly end. It was time for another to be the master of the Sith. The way it was, Sidious was all that was standing in the way of masters of the dark side from rising from the ashes.

And who better to lead that rise than the descendant of Darth Vader? Where he failed, Kylo Ren would be victorious. 

One of his guards approached, silent and submissive. Ren knew what he was here for before he spoke.

“Send her in.”

A sharp metallic tapping against the floor preluded her approach. In chromium armor, Captain Phasma was still the proud warrior she’d always been, with some slight alterations. No one failed the First Order as spectacularly as she had and go unpunished. Ren knew under the helmet, an implant had been added to correct any behavior the Order might find treacherous. It would be such a waste to execute a fine specimen of power as Phasma, but if she failed again, Ren would have no choice.

Kneeling, she crossed her arm across her chest. She waited for the Supreme Leader to address her.

“Captain Phasma,” he began. “I trust reconditioning has proven beneficial for you?”

“Yes, Supreme Leader.”

“Then, are you ready to redeem yourself?”

Still kneeling, she replied, “I’ll do what I am asked right away.”

He grinned under his helmet. “Twice you have been humiliated by the traitor, FN-2187. His victories are your failures. And your failures are failures to the First Order.”

Remembering visions of lush trees, tropical fruits, and rain, he gathered the details of her mission. The traitor was wise to keep the strange connection between enemies closed—Skywaker had taught him well—but the girl, Rey, sometimes wavered in her control over the bond. He only got a glimpse of where the Resistance was, but it was enough. 

“We have intel of the Resistance hiding out on a tropical world, possibly uninhabited,” he began. “Though we are not sure which world. That will be your job. Find the Resistance and bring me the last Jedi alive.”

She eyed him curiously, her expression also hidden under her own helmet. “I assume this has to do with your latest project?”

“Nothing gets past you, Phasma.” Ren smirked. “Skywalker is of no use to me. If you must kill him, you have my permission. His pupils, however, I want alive. We could have use for the two of them. FN-2187 would make an excellent leader of our new forces—after reconditioning, of course. The girl might be a bit more difficult to persuade, but I know she can be influenced to our cause.”

Slowly rising, Phasma nodded. “Understood. I will begin the search right away.”

“Do not fail me, Phasma.”

She saluted and walked away. The Supreme Leader lounged back in his seat, please with this development. He would deal with his adversary as the opportunity arose, but for now, he was curious to see what the disgraced captain would do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A short chapter this month, but I'm setting up the plot of this section here!


End file.
